Interviewing Drew Ross Tomorrow (Saturday 11/15) for Book Launch

I'm happy to be part of the official book launch even for Drew Ross' new book, Becoming the Twin Cities, which is a deep dive into the 19th and early 20th c. origins and evolution of Minneapolis and St. Paul. Ross' driving question here is "why didn't the Twin Cities just become one city?" It seems almost frivolous today, but looking back the answer to that question deeply surprised me! 

There are so many schemes and shenanigans in Ross' book that I didn't know about, and it was a real eye-opener. I can't wait to talk to him about his book on stage at the MN History Center tomorrow.

It's at 2:00 and free to the public. (You can also join via Zoom.) I hope to see you there!

[Facebook link; MNHS event page.]

You're Not From Here #6 at Black Hart on Wednesday 11/6: Fargo, Memphis, Singapore!

It's time once again for St. Paul's best live presentation show about people who somehow moved to the Twin Cities from elsewhere. I'm hosting the "You're Not From Here, Are You?: A Show for Transplants"  again this Wednesday at the Black Hart of St. Paul, on University Avenue. 

This month, come and hear from some fabulous guests. We have Naomi from Singapore, Will from Memphis, and Martha from Fargo! This will be the longest-distance we have ever covered, some truly unprecedented geography.

The show is guaranteed by me to be both informative and fun. This is not to mention that it is free! Come meet folks and learn a little bit.

• What: hour-long show about people from places
• When: 7pm on November 5th
• Where: Black Hart
• Why: learn stuff and meet people

See you then!

[The Mysteries of the Universe... Revealed!]

Signs of the Times #192

HOT POT

AND 

SUSHI

ALL YOU CAN EAT :)

BOBA

MILK TEA

FRUIT TEA

SLUSH

[Sandwich Board, Lyndale Avenue, Mpls.]

NO

PARKING

PLZ!

WEDNESDAY

(we need clearance

for blue box pick up

Wed July 2, 2025)

[Location forgotten.]

WE'VE

GOT

MAIL!

[Window. Edina.]

^

FOR REAL!

[Asphalt. Location forgotten.]

STUPID LOOKING

FAR 5

LOOSERS

[Southeast, Minneapolis.]

PALESTINIANS Deserve To

LIVE in their HOMELAND, as

FREE and EQUAL

CITIZENS

[Doorway. Central Avenue, Mpls.]

BULL

DOGS

ONLY

[Vent. NE Mpls.]

IF IN

NEED

PLEASE

TAKE!

We Got You!

-StPaul

[Cathedral Hill, St. Paul.]

NoPark

Cornbread

Park

ONLY

[Cedar-Riverside, Mpls.]

 

Top 5 Spookiest St. Paul Neighborhoods

[The spookiest house in St. Paul.]

It's that time of the year, spooky season. It got me thinking... what are the sppokiest parts of St. Paul? Where on my St. Paul wanders do I feel like actual ghosts exist?

# 5. The area around Newell Park

This neighborhood doesn't have a proper name, part of Hamline-Midway, but the area around Newell Park seems spooky to me. It's something about the twisted oak trees, and odd undulations of the savannah, the only remnant of what the land actually looked like before white settlement. The nearby railyard adds an eerie ambience, the Black Stack smoke stack looms, and the streets are just confusing enough to throw you a curve.   

# 4. Crosby Lake / Watergate / Old Rumtown

I was once in a dark cavern in the bluffs, deep underneath Davern Street, and came across an abandoned boat resting on the pitch-black sand. Walking past it, a hand-scrawled sign saying DANGER KEEP OUT appeared in the massive cavern, a abandoned entombed remnant of a Junior Chamber of Commerce haunted house, now sealed for eternity in its post-industrial tomb. The ghosts of the first refugee still haunt old Rumtown, evicted by Plympton at gunpoint.

# 3. West Side

Something about the West Side is spooky, probably the caves (again) lurking below, but also the hills and ravines and limestone retaining walls that slowly disintegrating in the moonlight. In late October, the cottonwood trees loom overhed, and you cannot erase the wildness of the bluffs from the margins of your memory, no matter how hard you try. Paths leading into the dark woods are there for those with eyes to see, leading down into the dark brambles and, eventually, over a cliff.

# 2. Area by the Half Time Rec

Front Avenue is home to more than cemetery, dating back to the era when this was the edge of town, and the tiny neighborhood tucked between the railroad tracks bumps elbows with the graves of nuns. To live in this odd nameless nook is to make peace with the dead, and it's apparent each Halloween that these cautious accommodations are not always smooth ones. The basement bocce court is haunted by the ghosts of grumpy old men, who bend the bounce of the balls ever so slightly with their lifetimes of frustration. 

# 1. Swede Hollow / Dayton's Bluff /  Railroad Island

When they burned the hollow homes the city leaders might have eradicatred the walls of the denizens of the city's timeless ravine, but it did nothing to their souls, who remain in the hollow to this day. The sun sets earlier down in along Phalen Creek, and the darkness wafts up to the bluffs overhead, haunting the dusty Victorian homes and nightly causing their radiators to creak and clank. A hairdresser once swore to me she had seen the ghost of Theodore Hamm stalking the top floor of the old abandoned brewery, and I believe her.

 

The Best Political Ad is One You Can Sit On

    

I remember hearing about these "sponsored" benches from Board of Estimate and Taxation Candidate Eric Harris Bernstein. The BET is easily the most obscure elected city government position that I know about, and it's rare that people even take the time and energy to run for it. But I am very impressed with Bernstein's campaign so far, based solely on his typeface designs and sittable signage. 

Instead of lawn signs, he's put his resources into hand-made benches for Minneapolis' parks. I saw two of them the other day in Kingfield.

What a great idea! Most campaign spending is the definition of ephemeral. Whether or not Bernstein wins or not, these benches will be providing a civic service for years. 

If I lived in Minneapolis, he'd have my vote based solely on this infrastructural brillinace.

Twin City Doorways #75

[Downtown, Minneapolis.]

[South Minneapolis.]

[Downtown, St. Paul.]

[Uptown, Minneapolis.]

[Downtown, Minneapolis.]

[Downtown, St. Paul.]

[East Side, St. Paul.]

[East Side, St. Paul.]

[Downtown, St. Paul.]

[Downtown, St. Paul.]

[West 7th, St. Paul.]

 

My Minnpost Festival Q&A Session is Now Online

In case you missed it, I gave an hour-long Q&A blab at the recent Minnpost Festival, where I was surprised and flattered to find people who actually wanted to ask questions about my Cityscape column and our Twin Cities. The whole day was great; the Tina Smith interview with Kara Swisher and the discussion with New Yorker television critic Emily Nussbaum were particularly excellent. 

And then there was me, too. Luckily, Minnpost video'd the whole thing, so you can watch it at your leisure. It's preserved for posterity, FWIW...

20th Anniversary of This Blog

Believe it or not... I started this blog 20 years ago today. It's still the best career move I've made, as writing publicly about cities and sidewalks turned out to guide almost every other path that's led me to where I'm at today: pretty contentedly writing and teaching about cities all day long. 

Yes, this Target; I spend a lot of time there now.

One of the great things about having done this for so long is I have a track-record and archive on which to look back. For example, one of the first public hearings I ever attended was about the new "Super Target" being planned for University Avenue. 

I went to the meeting where urbanist advocates were pushing to force Target to build something, anything along the street frontage of University Avenue.

Here's part of my decidedly unprofessional description of the 2006 meeting:

Then the two Toms got into the action. Yes, there were two Toms representing the Target Corporation. The first Tom was an architect, had grey gelled hair with a nice black suit and some fancy artist (architect?) glasses. The second Tom was "folksy," with a beige sportcoat and brown penny loafers, paunchy with male pattern baldness. After the long powerpointed introduction by the neighborhood advocate talking about fancy architecture, the two Toms had a few little tagboard illustrations of plans for the new SuperTarget.

Here's a fairly accurate rendition:

_________
|________|


So, they had these pictures of a big box Target and were trying to point out all the "amenities," like a sidewalk and a landscaped tree and a path through the parking lot, etc. It was pretty funny.

... The funniest part was this one dyed-haired old woman who had walked the block or two from her house to the meeting, and raised her hand duringg the Q & A and said, "Why do you have all these flowers and trees in the parking lot? They're just taking up space. Nobody will see them. I don't want flowers and trees in my parking lot."

I think about this experience, and the continuing problem of big box stores in the Midway, quite a bit. At the time, then-Council Member Debbie Montgomery assured me that Target would build something soon along University Avenue, and I remember her every time I pass the Target (I.e. every day) and stare at the vacant empty street-front asphalt. It's nice to have a long memory when you're contemplating city politics.

Anyway, thanks for reading. I don't have nearly enough time to update this regularly, but still keep it dear to my heart.

Opt-out Transit Agencies' High Overhead

High floor buses I can understand. High overhead unnecessary transit agencies are a bridge too far for me. 

A few months ago I wrote about why I think the opt-out bus agencies -- mainly Mississippi Valley Transit (MTVA) and Southwest Transit -- should be disbanded. Or, at the very least, the impending change in funding structure should give leverage to state officials to more closely scrutinize the frustrating, fragmentary arrangement. 

You can read it here, but the gist is thus:

The downsides of an opt-out system center on lack of efficiency, scale and planning conflict. As a whole, multiple overlapping government agencies are an expensive solution for “local” concerns, and the opt-out agencies have a lot of duplicative overhead. For example, instead of one branding or ad campaign, you have five. It’s the same for websites, apps or other other administrative positions that scale effectively, like HR offices or executive leadership. Today, all those costs are currently multiplied five-fold across the region.  

Since writing the piece, I received an interesting email from a Minnpost reader named Nick who had been digging into salary information, something I also tried to do without success. (Agency budgets and information is really hard to find, as the public board meetings don't have thorough minutes available.) 

Anyway, they did a public data request for top transit agency leadership salaries at MVTA versus Metro Transit and came up with the following chart:

This is 2024 public information.

I just want to point out that the (IMO excellent) GM Lesley Kanderas of Metro Transit is overseeing a staff of over 3,200 people that provides 47.5 million rides a year. She made $245,842 in 2024. The respective numbers for the CEO of MVTA are around 35 employees*, 1.6 million rides, and $326,819 dollars a year.

This is not to mention the other folks running the show at MVTA. I think this speaks for itself.

* I can't find an exact number, but it's between 30-40. I think they contract out bus drivers staffing to avoid unionization.

Q&A Discussion at Minnpost Festival Tomorrow

Minnpost Festival is tomorrow in downtown Minneapolis, and I'm going to have a Q&A discussion about cities and the upcoming election -- and anything else people want to talk about. There's a great list of famous guests including Governor Walz, AG Ellison, Senator Smith, and more. 

Then there's me. I'm part of a "breakout session" at 3:15 and will be hosted by our new editor Leah Fabel. Hope to see you there! Bring any questions you have about the future of our Twin Cities.

You're Not From Here #5 on Wednesday 10/1 at the Black Hart

 

Everyone's favorite show about transplants, folks who somehow moved to the Twin Cities and stuck around. I'm hosing You're Not From Here, Are You: A Show for Transplants this Wednesday at the Black Hart of St. Paul, on University Avenue. 

This month, come and hear from some fabulous guests. Anna from Crawfordsville, Kelly from Auburn, and Teressa from a bunch of places including Moscow (the one in Russia, not the one in Idaho)!

For those of you paying attention, that's a double dose of Indiana, followed by a deep dive into post-Cold War Eastern Europe. It's a lot of fun. And it's free!

• What: hour-long show about people from places
• When: 7pm on October 1st
• Where: Black Hart
• Why: learn stuff and meet people

See you then!

Talking Smack about Minneapolis tomorrow at the Black Hart

A legitimate amateur stand-up comedian (and friend), Nate Hood was unable to make this gig, so Sustain St. Paul has asked me to step in and explain something really important. A long last, I will be telling the world why St. Paul is better than Minneapolis.

That's right. I will do my best. I have receipts. I have research. I have vibes. I was born in Minneapolis, to my father's great dismay. I even lived there for almost six months, so I know what's up. It's also a topic that I have been pondering  on a near-weekly basis for 24 years.

In other words, I have some thoughts. I'll boil it all down into a five-minute talk that, I dearly hope, will enlighten and entertain.

So please come to the joint Sibling Rivalry Fundraiser, to benefit two great groups, Sustain St. Paul and Neighbors for More Neighbors. You will not be disappointed, and the money is going to a great cause.

Tomorrow, Thursday, at the Black Hart of St. Paul. I'll be talking in the 2nd half of the evening, around 7:30, but the rest of the speaker lineup is amazing. 

Someone asked me my official slogan about this event. Here it is: "I know more about Minneapolis than anyone ever should."

You're Not From Here #4 at Black Hart on Wednesday 9/3

Great news! After a month’s summer vacation, the You’re Not From Here, Are You? (A Show for Transplants) its back at the Black Hart of St. Paul next Wednesday, 9/3 at 7pm. I have some great guests lined up, representing the towns of Perkasie, New Bern, and Des Moines. 

I can't help but share this tidbit, too: One guest happens to be Em Cassel, editor, writer, and co-owner of Racket. Not only will she be telling us about Perkasie, she'll be sharing some insights gained from their recent article on how transplants make friends in the Twin Cities. 

I hope to see you there!

Twin City Doorways #74

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

 

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

[Detroit, MI.]

[University of Minnesota, Mpls.]

[Downtown, Mpls.]

[Detroit, MI.]

Public Character #10: Kimberly, who Plants and Waters the Traffic Circle at Charles and Albert

[Kimberly clearing leaves, planting plants in the early spring, before the blooming.]

Fun fact: I live and bike on Charles Avenue, one of the few bicycle boulevards in the Twin Cities that isn't a dud. Last spring, I happened across a woman who was weeding and planting plants on one of my favorite traffic circles  on the street. There aren't enough traffic circles on Charles because the city did a half-assed job with this street, but that makes the ones that do exist all the more precious to me. And it's great to see people in the neighborhood spending a bit of time making them look nice. 

Anyway, Kimberly was nice enough to chat with me and tell me about why she cares about this bit of public space. Here you go!

[Interview starts.]

Twin City Sidewalks [TCS]: So they install them and then they sort of let them go, the city… And then it’s up to neighbors to make them nice??

Kimberly [K]: Well when it was… so, this one specifically, it was installed probably 16 years ago, if not 17. And the reason was, at that time, I had a very young child. People could come speeding down here and go straight to Walmart. And so they wouldn’t stop here at all, and within two years there were lots of accidents. And this is ridiculous! My then husband, we petitioned the city for a stop sign. And they literally said “stop signs don’t work, but you can put in a traffic circle.” And, OK, sure. We had to go around and get all the signatures and everything. I think we needed 75% of the people…

TCS: … of every block, or just the corner? 

K: No, this block, this block. [points] Just these blocks. And then they gave us money to plant in the beginning, but I became the official garden steward.

TCS: How official?

K: Right, well, I’m not paid for it. I just volunteer. I just go head and buy the plants, and Thomas helps and Joann here always helps as well. And many neighbors. If I had put it out on our little neighbors site [they might be helping], but today was when I had time. So I’m like, I’m just gonna go out and work on it now. 

But I try to buy plants, annuals, to plant here. I just see that as my volunteer contribution for the neighborhood. But watering? We used to… we could get a permit from the city and go to the hydrant, but it just gotten to be a pain in the tush. And so Thomas and Joann will let us water with their hose, so that’s their contribution, so there’s a cost to that too.

TCS: Yeah cool. What are you just clearing leaves right now? 

K: Yeah, I’m clearing everything out. And I’m gonna actually rearrange a little bit this year and plant a few annuals and I’ll get some mulch and we attempt to water and weed throughout the season. Last year was a little rough; we didn’t get to as much. But each year is hopeful. 

TCS: Well, thanks for your labor, in this under appreciated venture.

K: Well, it’s surprising. You know, there are some people that don’t like traffic circles. And there’’s blowback about it. But for the most part people are kind, and when I’m out here people will just roll down their window when they’re driving past and say thank you. So overall I think they’re appreciated. 

TCS: I appreciate them. They slow people down. On a bike, speeding is really my issue. 

K: And that was the big thing, was the speeding and the accidents. This is supposed to be a neighborhood. Slow down people! 

TCS: Thanks!

[More pictures of Kimberly's work; you can see it for yourself next time you bike around St. Paul!]