Hi
Sidewalk Guy/Gal-
Do you have any history or observations (remembrances) of Stendahl’s,
1001 Nicollet Avenue? (shoes on first floor, bridal on
second!?) What happened with that business after a 1972 fire?
I
believe it was part of the “bridal corner” of 10th
and Nicollet, or was that 10th/Marquette.
Thank
you,
Something Old
Dear Something Old:
Having
never been a bride in the 70s, I'd never heard of this. I did a Google search and nothing came up. I looked it up on the Minnesota Historical Society database too. Nothing.
I did, however, buy
my only suit at Nate's Clothing which used to be on 1st
Avenue and while I was there shopping all the old guys were watching
the Cubs play a day game on a TV above the cash register, and I found
that really charming for some reason, particularly as I was being
measured by gent with a measuring tape. Nate's was also across from
the Army Surplus store (somehow still there) and so one might have
called that the “Groom's Corner”, as it contained all you needed
to both get married and to flee, escaping into the wilderness to
survive off foraging and small game. Alas, Nate's is no more.
Yours,
TC
Sidewalks
Dear Sidewalks:
Glad
I came across your post. As someone working on a project in
alternative transportation funding with a particular focus on its
politics, I was pleased to see you making points I try to make.
Recently I gave a presentation at the Transportation Research
Board/University of Florida Workshop on Innovative Transportation
Pricing.
I
especially liked your point about how standing at the gas pump is
“the most visible, visceral economic relationship we have to our
vehicles”. That very point was at the inception of our
project (Efficient Vehicle Assessor (EVA)). EVA has grown to
address other urgent needs but at its root is this notion:
Of
all the tools government has to incent or encourage behavior, the tax
is arguably the most effective (excluding passing a law mandating or
outlawing something) tool policy-makers have.
When the gas
tax was conceived (at least in the iteration under Eisenhower),
transportation funding was its only goal, the only thing we needed it
to do. There were no worries about carbon emissions,
petro-terrorism, etc.
So
while the current gas tax approach made sense then, it doesn’t
now. In fact, as currently structured, it pits our funding
needs in direct opposition to our environmental and energy needs
(both of which are urgent). It is a single, blunt
tool that is so crudely designed as to be almost useless as a policy
tool.
EVA
is based on the notion that the most effective place to effect
consumer behavior is at the gas pump, where everyone is, as you point
out, hyper-sensitive to the price. And so the concept of EVA
was born: A variable-agnostic platform for transportation
pricing. Any number of factors can go into the calculation of
the tax – vehicle characteristics, socio-economic factors (the
current flat structure is quite regressive), as well as many others.
In short, whatever policy-makers agree are the factors needed (and
that will surely differ from state to state).
I
won’t go on further here. I’ll just point you to our
project website www.evasmartpump.com
and compliment you again on your post (for which I’ve posted a link
on our news link page).
Best,
Eva
Dear
Eva:
I
like this, I suppose. Much like everyone on Earth, I hate standing at
the gas pump. (This is why the states of New Jersey and Oregon have
made it illegal to stand at your own gas pump.) And really the only
thing that could make standing at the gas pump bearable is looking
over at the next sucker standing at the next gas pump and seeing that
he's driving a mid-90s Chevrolet Suburban Extend-o-thon which gets 11
mpgs, and so the delicious feeling of schadenfreude sweeps over you
like a wave.
And
really the only thing that could make that schadenfreude any better
would be knowing that the gas pump was programmed somehow to charge
him MORE for living out in Rodgers, MN, or for owning four cars, or
for being in the top income bracket (in this case the schadenfreude
target in question would be more likely driving a Porsche Cayenne
Turbo). Then the schadenfreude might reach serotonin highs normally
only achievable with chemicals or bodily passion, neither of which
typically occur anywhere near a gasoline pump, which would somehow
form this subliminal neuron connection in my habit memory
associating pumping gas with ecstatic pleasure, leading me to think
of little else besides gasoline schadenfreude during my everyday
humdrum life, leading me to seek out more and more frequent ways to
“fill my tank”, at which point I too would buy a mid-90s Suburban
and drive to and from Elko just to pick up a shrink-wrapped Deli
Express ham sandwich for lunch (and of course to “get my gas on”)
at which point both my wallet and my soul would be emptier then the
town square of downtown Mandan on a cold Saturday evening in
February.
So,
yeah, I don't think your idea is very likely to happen. All of our
politicians are still sniffing gas fumes like there's no tomorrow.
Yours,
TC Sidewalks
Dear TC Sidewalks:
So....
I've got a traffic/planning proposal. Thought it might be interesting
to get y'all's take on it. Here's the idea:
Convert
Main St SE to one-way (direction of travel: NW) from 6th Ave to
Hennepin.
Here's
why:
*
Bike traffic is really picking up.
*
So is pedestrian traffic.
*
Cars trolling main st move too slowly and seem to get lost all the
time, not to mention looking for parking is weird and awkward.
*
Bike/pedestrian traffic has REALLY picked up in the summer time this
year.
So...
what if Main St was 1-way? We could reduce the road's width, and
widen/install real bike lanes. The would make pedestrians &
bikers a lot happier. I think even cars would be happier, because it
would be a bit easier to drive down the street and figure out where
you're going. Plus, 2nd street is really underutilized relative to
its size, so it could handle the spillover traffic from a
reduced-size main st.
What
do you think? Is it a good/bad idea? Could I convince the city to do
it? Or at least study it?
Thanks,
Juan
Weigh
Dear
Juan:
I
hate one way streets. I like two way streets, but only if they're
sized the same as a one -way street so that if two cars enter the
street from opposite ends of the block, they have to confront each
other and one of them has to eventually give up and put their car
into reverse, only to discover that there are two or three more cars
heading their direction coming from behind them and so the driver of
the potentially backing up car has to get out and attempt to explain
and convince the other drivers heading his direction that it's an
impossible impasse and their best way forward is to go back, only its
difficult to do this, and none of the other drivers believe him,
perhaps because our driver is so self-sacrificing in the first place
and lacks the necessary charisma or rhetorical capability. So then
everyone gets out of their cars to go see the impasse first hand with
their own eyes and when they do so, all massed in an angry huddle,
staring at two rows of cars stuck facing each other with no way out,
they realize that maybe they didn't want to be driving that day in
the first place and, confronted with the absurdity of the situation,
they all decide to walk to their destinations instead, or maybe even
skip their destination altogether and go off to the nearest pub to
grab a pint together and sing songs in three-part harmony.
That's my dream. Your dream is a one-way street on Main Street SE. Well, I hate one way streets, but I actually like 5th Street SE, which is a mega-traffic-calmed one way street with a contra-flow bike lane, so maybe if they did that it'd be cool.
Though I dare say that the street would be aimed in the opposite direction, so that traffic coming off the Hennepin Avenue bridge could turn down the street and find parking (or whatever it is that cars do).
Also, nobody at the city will make any changes to the street unless they have the complete backing of all the local business owners and the city council person, which in your case is Diane Hofstedte, so you're probably screwed.
Best of luck!
TC Sidewalks
