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Ole Avenue questions persist
Ole Avenue is St. Olaf’s planned residence hall/townhome project: This is an exciting project, mostly. New residence halls and townhomes will bring students back on campus, St. Olaf Avenue will be reinforced as the tree-lined entrance to the campus from downtown and the pretty, shady campus look and feel will extend further down The Hill. […]
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Vote local
Northfield City Council elections might seem less than important when the world is on fire both literally (wildfires, protests) and figuratively (covid-19, presidential election, Black Lives Matter, Supreme Court, climate destruction, recession, unemployment…). Most people think of city government as the lowest level of government and presumably less important. Local races may not generate the […]
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Urbanists tweet about the roundabout
Last week, the Strib ran an article about Northfield’s planned roundabout with tunnels for people biking and walking: Twitter responds As a result, one local urbanist (streets.mn founder, active with Strong Towns, Planning Commissioner, and good guy) tweets: In turn, famous walkability guy Jeff Speck chimes in: After a bit of back and forth, the […]
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UPDATE! Northfield does get the message right
Look! Northfield has updated its sidewalk stencils for directing bicycle traffic off the sidewalks: A few years ago, I complained about the City of Northfield’s misleadingly negative image on downtown sidewalks: Really, let’s have more bikes downtown (and skateboards – also prohibited on the sidewalks!). Just walk them on the sidewalk where there’s very limited […]
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Golden Opportunity paved over at Greenvale Park
The new Greenvale Park Elementary School will improve the inside-the-building issues from no doors to more security to better tech and has been planned with detailed input from teachers and parents. Far less attention was paid to outside the school, however, and the golden opportunity created by building a new school to explicitly consider the […]
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History Matters: How we got to the roundabout at Jefferson Parkway and Division Street
The Northfield City Council is poised to approve a design for a roundabout plus bike and walk facilities at Jefferson Parkway and Division Street/TH246. This is a once-in-a-generation large project to begin to reconnect Northfield could have been avoided or been approached incrementally if the City and School District had made more future-thinking, system-level decisions. […]
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The tip of the Ice Arena budget iceberg
The voters said “no” to building a new Arena, but the old Arena is still City property, is still operated by the City, is still barely functional, and whether to fix it is still unresolved. But budget season for the City will soon be underway and some choices will need to be made.
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ADUs: Reframing the discussion
After what seemed like unanimity and a strong sense of purpose at the Planning Commission, the Council discussion about Accessory Dwelling Units has been dispiriting to watch thus far and the public comments even more so. Since the Council will have another go at ADUs today, Tuesday, April 9, 2019 at their worksession, I’d like […]
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2018’s Greatest Hits (and misses)
Because it’s New Year’s Eve, it must be time to review 2018, right? What I Read in 2018 Although my favorite novel of the year was Michael Ondaatje’s Warlight, I’m having a huge amount of fun with The Art of the Fold, and I failed (again) to finish Gravity’s Rainbow, here’s the list of blog-relevant […]
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Fun urbanism: Making repelling bollards more inviting
Bollards are booming since the 9/11 bombings in the United States and more recent vehicular terrorism in London (and elsewhere). Bollards and other defensive architecture may protect buildings and sidewalks from vehicles, but they typically don’t encourage people to come enjoy public spaces. Jersey barriers are probably only redeemable by really great graffiti or art […]