Minneapolis, MN
Minneapolis, and its twin Saint Paul across the river, are amongst the most prosperous of the northern Midwestern cities. Saint Paul is the state capital, and Minneapolis houses the main campus of the University of Minnesota, with over 50,000 students. The different political structures and cultures of the Twin Cities provide many opportunities for comparison.
Thoughts from Minneapolis
University of Minnesota bike programs
My first meeting in Minneapolis was with Steve Sanders, director of their bike and pedestrian programs. Steve has been around UMN for a long time, and has done a lot to encourage cycling during his time there. Partly as a result of his work, the Washington Avenue Bridge, which is the main bike link between downtown Minneapolis and the main campus (which are on opposite sides of the river) sees 7,000 cyclists a day during the school year.
Steve also runs the Dero ZAP bike commuting program. Participants get an RFID chip to attach to their spokes, and readers on…
Bike infrastructure and identity politics
Arriving back in Oakland, I got stuck in traffic when #BlackLivesMatter closed down the freeway. It highlighted for me that the most interesting things I’ve found on these research trips have been related to identity politics. From the exclusions of the Southern Walnut Creek bike path in Austin, to the controversy over the North Minneapolis Greenway (more on that later), to the lack of east-west connections in Columbus (more on that also), I keep coming across interesting social issues which play out in cycle infrastructure. It feels like a rich and timely topic.
Minneapolis neighborhoods
On my first morning in Minneapolis, the first thing I saw was a woman on a bike. The street grid where I was staying is almost entirely natural bikeway. The residential streets are relatively narrow and tree-lined. Driveways are mostly in alleyways behind the houses, so the streetscape is continuous and human-friendly. Various cues like the lack of pavement markings signal to drivers that these are low-speed neighborhood streets.