twin city sidewalks

2009-07-24

Sidewalk Weekend! #31

Sidewalk rating: Suspenseful

Walking on sidewalks is a thrill a minute as storm fronts blow in and out like an asthmatic breathalyzer tester. Get your ticket to raindrops and drizzle and clouds and wind and humid sunshine today on the sidewalks of the Twin Cities!

[Como Park at night. Video fm. MPR]

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This video is one of many on display at the Walker right now in their exhilirating exhibit, The Quick and The Dead...

... It's a Belgian artist named Francis Alÿs pushing ice around the sidewalks of Mexico City, and it shows you one of the many ways in which sidewalk traces can be left behind. It also is the ultimate Sisyphus + pedestrian image.

I highly recommend the show at the Walker! You'll laugh, you'll cry.

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I drove up I-35 to Duluth last weekend, and passed a sign declaring that some orange cones were funded by the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), aka. "the stimulus package".

Despite these occasional headlines, all reports suggest that the vast majority of the federal dollars spent these days are going to 'invest' in technologies that will be increasingly obsolete as gas continues to disappear and we continue to destroy our planet. James Kunstler seems more right every day.

In other words, this video pretty much perfectly illustrates the American way of life:

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This spoof perfectly captures the matter-of-fact bureaucratic tone that is omnipresent in planning and engineering documents.

I'd like to see similar suggestions: the Stone Arch Bridge sold on eBay to cover Minneapolis's budget deficit, Fort Snelling razed for a new Vikings stadium, the Mississippi River covered over and replaced with a new 8-lane freeway?

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This article from a Seattle indie paper is a nice statement of principles about density, and the need for smaller overall projects.

Plan on a smaller scale.

Double the grid density.

Build shorter, narrower buildings with smaller spaces.

Keep the first floors tall (12 feet) and flexible-use, so that they can evolve from residences to shops to offices to garages and back over the years.

Seek diversity.

Make it last.

Cities seem to always want giant complexes that will take up the entire block, huge development projects.

Diversity and intersting places, on the other hand, are far better served by many, many small developments. The same principles applies to big business v. small business. You're far better served by having a diverse economy made of many small, enterprising, and mutually-dependent compaines (San Francisco) than one dependent on a few giant conglomerations (Detroit).

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Trying to communicate while driving a car is inane You only have one horn, and nobody knows if you're honking for peace, Jesus, because you think some girl is attractive, or because you're majorly pissed off.

Much preferred:

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Here's an interesting way to make drivers more aware of pedestrians: make them nervous with crazy road lines on the side of the road.

Complete streets demands increasing the feeling of safety for all types of users. Ironically, increasing safety will mean making the drivers of cars feel more dangerous, and drive with more caution. It's kind of like what's happening with drivers and bicycles all through the TC, apparently.

Is this a paradox?

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Every time I've been to Boston, I've loved to hang out on my friend's back porches. These "three deckers" all seem to have big back porches that open up onto courtyards behind the houses.

It's part of the "vernacular archtiecture" of the Northeast. How can we create a policy landcscape that values keeping original structures around?

[A Boston three-decker. Img. fm. NYTimes.]

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I've talked about desire paths before, but these seem more desperate somehow.

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Marx takes on cars and cities as two sides of the same coin.

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A good bike typography.

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Three photos for you!

1) A crit in Uptown. (Img. CarbonSilver.)

2) New York -- Miles Davis, 32, of 881 10th Avenue, a trumpeter now appearing in Birdland, 52nd Street and Broadway, was arrested after fighting with patrolman Gerald Kilduff, who had ordered him to move from crowded sidewalk. In the scuffle, Davis was hit on the head with a blackjack for which a St. Clare's ambulance had to be called. (1959). (Img. Tsupen.)

3) A sidewalk shack by the art collective Hardland/Heartland, at Franklin and Lyndale. (Img. fm. StuffAboutMinneapolis.)

2009-07-22

Sidewalk of the Week: 7th Place Mall

Q: What is the difference between Minneapolis and Saint Paul?

A: Minneapolis is a little big city, and Saint Paul is a big small town.

Sometimes it strikes me, that’s just a witty way of saying that Saint Paul has long been the red-headed stepchild of the Twin Cities, fostering an inferiority complex that would put Chicago Cubs fans to shame. Ever and onward the claims of political importance, historical precedence, or cultural relevance echo like so many steamboat horns from the cries of Saint Paul’s defenders, and always the epicenter of the Twin Cities moves westward, slouching towards Edina and America's suburban future. Saint Paul and the East metro are left to fend for the scraps of modernity, grasping at straws, hockey, and the hopes light rail lines.

The Twin City relationship is nothing new, of course. Ever since the great Twin City census war of 1890, each has been trying to outdo the other. Yet, while Saint Paul has a few advantages, the wrestling match today has all the suspense of a Globetrotters v. Generals contest.

[The lovely patio of the Wild Tymes bar and restaurant on the 7th Place Mall.]

The case in point? Each town’s downtown pedestrian mall.

Now, a pedestrian mall is a tough thing to pull off. Like many of the 1960s' modern downtown planning trends, most did more harm than good to their cities’ . Minneapolis’ Nicollet Mall is a national exception, somehow managing to barely hang on to a critical mass of retailers and street activity through the 20th century’s bleakest urban decades.

Saint Paul was not so lucky. As with many futuristic panaceas, Saint Paul watched what its more successful sibling was doing across the river, and then kind of half-heartedly copied it.

(It makes you think of the popular song, “Everything you can do, I can do too / Yet always in a more depressing way... / Pave the roads and live with me / In the Capitol Ci-tee!”)

Instead of a long, landscaped stretch of street running through the center of town, Saint Paul’s downtown mall is single seedy block of antiquated rarity, a microcosm of economic futility and humble charm.

[The Great Waters Brewpub sits on the corner in the beautiful and gargantuan Hamm building, where the 7th Place Mall ajoins the historical center of the city.]

If Saint Paul is a big small town, then the one block long 7th Place Mall is like the convenience store where locals sit and to watch traffic going by. Its a fine bit of sidewalk with a bleak sort of charm. It epitomizes Saint Paul's micro-energy, the sense of unique cultural remoteness that makes the Twin Cities great. You see, there’s a special creativity to boredom and abandonment, and when the 7th place mall fills up with a few folks, you really start to feel special, part of a small world where everybody knows your name.

[One of Saint Paul's many delightful alleys abuts the 7th Place Mall near the Park Square Theater.]

A complete list of things found in 7th Place: The pair of bars on the end of the street, The Artist’s Quarter jazz club, the Park Square theater, the huge and abandoned Palace theater, a pair of dueling sandwich shops, Candyland, and an impossibly-early-closing drug store. Closed off on one end by the epic revitalization failure of “town square” and on the other end by the absurdly out-of-place Saint Paul Cos / Traveler's building, which fits into its historic neighborhood with all the grace of a Smithfield pig at a hypochondriac convention, 7th Place is a lovely mix of Saint Paul's historical pasts and its economic present.

[Kids play music before the Jimmy John's in the 7th Place Mall.]

Sometimes the bleak emptiness of the 7th Place mall overwhelms you with the distinct sense of being a restless teenager in downtown Mandan. But on other nights, it can have the warmth and coziness of the New York’s famous Paley Park, a little pocket of life in the middle of a city. As you turn the corner and walk down the little block stretch to find your way, to find a blues guitar player or an old man picking his nose before a pigeon, you realize that Saint Paul is not a place that will overwhelm you. It’s a place that’s just big enough to understand, just big enough to make you feel at home. And someday, when the 7th Place mall fills to capacity, it might just exceed your expectations.

[An elderly fellow picks his nose before a pigeon on a bench in the 7th Place Mall.]

2009-07-14

A North End Sidewalk Tragedy

[The sidewalk outside Schroder's Bar in Saint Paul, where the terrible accident took place.]

A few months ago, I went into my neighborhood bar and ordered a Summit from my favorite bartender. She seemed a bit sad, and when I asked about it, told me a terrible story...

She'd been working the previous Sunday night, and this young couple had come into the joint to celebrate their 21st birthday. While they were leaving, putting stuff into their car on Front Avenue, a car blew a red light, speeding down the street, and plowed into the two people. One of the girl's legs had to be amputated.

It was one tiny instant of car culture in America, and in this case, it turned into a complete tragedy. It changed these two people's lives forever. Neither of them will ever be the same. My bartender friend saw the whole thing, and she could barely talk about it.

Schroder's is just a little blue collar joint in the middle of an old Saint Paul neighborhood. People go there to hang out and be a part of a community. The corner (Como/Front/Dale) used to be very walkable, back when all the businesses fronted the nearby Great Northern railroad. This corner still has a lot of businesses, but the intersection is wide open pavement.

Is this another case where the suburbanization of urban streets (helping to increase traffic flow) led to a tragic accident? Could bump outs, or traffic calming efforts, have decreased the likelihood of something like this occurring?

They might have. But I'm not so convinced, in this case. This was a dude fleeing from the cops, out of control, and going down a relatively narrow street without concern for other human life.

It does raise the question of whether or not police should pursue people through urban neighborhoods. Am I wrong, or do some cities ban high speed pursuits through cities just for this very reason?

[An old North End factory in Saint Paul, circa 1900. Img. fm. MNHS.]

Link:

St. Paul gang member who injured couple while fleeing police is sentenced for drugs - Pioneer Press

A St. Paul gang member was sentenced in federal court to 11 years in prison in connection with the North End crash that left several people severely injured Aug. 27.

St. Paul police were chasing Wendell Raymone Jones, 21, when he smashed into the back of a car on Front Avenue, crushing Mari Plaster and her boyfriend, Dan Sanford, both 21, between that car and the one in front.

The couple had been loading gifts into the car trunk after celebrating Plaster's 21st birthday at Schroeder's Bar and Grill.

Plaster's left leg was partially severed below the knee and had to be amputated. Sanford had multiple fractures in both legs. Plaster's father and his wife were also injured.

Jones, a known member of the Selby Siders gang, was sentenced Thursday on one count of possessing with intent to distribute 50 grams of crack cocaine. U.S. District Court Judge Ann Montgomery also sentenced him to five years of supervised release. He was indicted Nov. 13 and pleaded guilty Jan. 29.

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