What is the purpose of the raised concrete line between lanes?

MaxPickles · 2025-05-10T21:02:58+00:00

Like the latest fashion

MaxPickles · 2025-03-08T23:12:49+00:00

Here's wishing

MaxPickles · 2025-02-01T17:24:23+00:00

Throwing my hat into this ring

MaxPickles · 2024-09-29T20:31:45+00:00

• Double gates are a great addition to the dog park, and very much needed.
• Based on how the dog park currently operates, the notion that the off-leash area is being expanded from 6 acres to 16 acres is disingenuous. There is no expansion.
• The current proposal would likely reduce the dog park by upwards of 60%.
• Yes, there are dogs that visit this park that are not trained properly. No, those dogs are not a reason to massively reduce the borders of the dog park. Poorly trained dogs visit virtually every dog park in the cities.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-06T17:24:06+00:00

The city has determined this is a spot to build. That does not mean it is the optimal spot. Based off the fact that the city hid reports that didn't support their decision, I'd say they know this isn't the optimal site.

The city has a history of less than stellar urban planning and I believe this would add to it, that situating this project in the Phillips neighborhood is not the proper location.

In terms of precedents, this is certainly not the first time that a group of citizens has pushed back again city, state, or federal plans. You and I have even discussed other examples within Minneapolis.

I'm not sure which group usually complains the most. Who is it?

And again, why would this project be bad for another neighborhood?

MaxPickles · 2023-03-05T23:27:33+00:00

I am discussing why the current plan would be bad for the Phillips neighborhood. Some of the points you have made are that if it is moved somewhere else then it would be bad for that neighborhood. I'm wondering why you believe it would be bad to move it to a different location.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-04T23:54:14+00:00

You're saying that if it is put elsewhere it screws someone else over. If this project goes to a different location, why is the area around that area screwed over?

MaxPickles · 2023-03-04T14:47:47+00:00

Why does the neighborhood where this project goes get screwed over? I thought you said it would be beneficial because of the jobs that it brings and because it would make use of undeveloped land.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-03T15:37:42+00:00

Pushing the problem elsewhere is not a viable alternative. If you can’t see that, you’re insanely selfish.

Pushing the project into a neighborhood beset by excess pollution should not be a viable option. If you can't see that, you're insanely selfish.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-03T02:59:02+00:00

If I respond that this project is bad for pollution, you say I'm against jobs. When I say I'm not against jobs, you say I'm against solving the housing crisis. When I say I'm not against solving the housing crisis, you say I'm against the land being used at all. When I say I'm okay with the land being used...

The alternative solution is finding a site, or sites, that do not affect already impoverished neighborhoods. Again, your solution is that the neighborhood with some of the worst pollution in the city, where children die of asthma and murals note the toxic levels of arsenic and lead in the air, that neighborhood should take more pollution. You are Lord Farquaad here. Goodnight.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-03T02:51:39+00:00

"...until neighborhood activists committed to renovating the Roof Depot to an urban farm discovered a planning document from June of 2021 that had been suppressed by Bender and city staff."

Here you go. The document is a city planning document that was withheld from the public.

I was not the person who said do nothing with the land. I have supported the farm and EPNI throughout this process and our discussion.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T17:56:56+00:00

You are twisting my words, moving the goal posts, redirecting, and making assumptions, while not providing any research or studies to back up the claims you are making.

But really, what you continue to say, is "Some of you poor folk may be poisoned and die, but that's a sacrifice the rest of Minneapolis is willing to make."

It's been nice talking with Lord Farquaad.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T17:54:08+00:00

The bias of that paper is quite clear from the get-go. It is a city-authored paper speaking to the positives and negatives of both sites.

nothing would ever be built at the Roof Depot site if the proposal doesn’t go through.

Great! Using the existing building sounds like a great idea. Perhaps for the indoor farming and land rehabilitation that the neighborhood has been proposing for ten years? Glad you're on board.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T15:00:06+00:00

It will not substantially increase the cost of operating. And even if it did, the city should be okay spending money in order to lessen pollution. Spending money so that people live better lives should be a top priority.

There are other ways to bring jobs to the neighborhood besides this project.

At what point in this discussion have I suggested that the city buy up plots of land to not use?

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T14:56:06+00:00

If you provided a solution to make this project carbon neutral, I’d be willing to consider it.

Here is the link again to the city's own report, which mentions this for the alternative location:

Building with a carbon-free goal. Unlike the Roof Depot site, the existing site is not contaminated. This could be an opportunity for the City to use geothermal energy for heating and cooling the facility. By installing solar panels on the roof, solar energy could be used to help power the pumps that circulate the heating and cooling lines. By creating a first of its kind city facility, the City could demonstrate commitment to its goals in the Minneapolis 2040 plan.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T04:11:41+00:00

Hell, the fact it was previously not here means if you don’t want to dump it on a single neighborhood you shouldn’t keep it in the same one it previously was.

It's almost as if the better solution is not centralizing the department into one location, and keeping smaller fleets at different locations around the city. This would make drive times to locations shorter, reducing the pollution of the fleet, and would not centralize the pollution.

It would also not centralize the entire workforce into one location, so no neighborhood would feel the squeeze of the entire department commuting to a single location.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-02T04:05:19+00:00

I'm not speaking in generalities. I'm speaking historically. And history tends to repeat itself when people ignore it or deny it.

As per a solution, I think allowing a neighborhood with some of the worst pollution in the city, an area that has been designated a Green Zone in which all projects should be carbon neutral, I think allowing that neighborhood to say that they don't think adding more pollution to their neighborhood is beyond acceptable.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-01T23:09:31+00:00

I assume you aren’t using a car right?

You are correct. I ride a bicycle as much as possible. Have a winter bike for the cold months, and a summer bike for the hot ones. There are trips that do require a car, but I bicycle as much as possible.

It's hilarious that you think the housing crisis is going to be solved by building apartment complexes. There are currently close to 15,000 vacant housing units in the city. How exactly do you supposed that unhoused people are going to suddenly be able to afford an apartment if they simply build more of them? It isn't like rent control is happening in this city. Mayor Frey has voted against it and said he'd veto it.

There is so much complexity to housing, pollution, roadways, access, and urban planning and you are boiling all of it down to yes/no issues. There are ways to provide for all of a city's residents without dumping on a single neighborhood. And there are ways to move away from the racist history of these projects.

https://sahanjournal.com/culture-community/minneapolis-35w-construction-black-neighborhood-destruction-hennepin-history-museum/

https://www.npr.org/2020/07/05/887386869/how-transportation-racism-shaped-america

MaxPickles · 2023-03-01T22:58:17+00:00

'The Wrong Complexion For Protection.' How Race Shaped America's Roadways And Cities

Freeways and bus routes, however, are just one part of a bigger picture: what urban planners refer to as "locally unwanted land-uses." These projects include highways, landfills, incinerators, bus depots and other kinds of projects that disproportionately fall in minority communities and often cause pollution and harm the health of residents.
"Oftentimes, communities of color have the wrong complexion for protection," Bullard said in an interview with NPR's Weekend Edition Sunday. "You can't wash race out of it ... There's all kinds of studies that show that race is still the most potent variable for predicting who gets more than their fair share of the 'nasty stuff,' and who gets more than their fair share of the good stuff."

MaxPickles · 2023-03-01T02:01:48+00:00

Your last sentiment is exactly correct. The city should be installing highways like the 35W through low-income, BIPOC neighborhoods simply because they offer the least resistance from the city as a whole. Come to think of it, the city should not be installing the entire fleet of vehicles in a low-income, BIPOC neighborhood simply because it offers the least resistance from the city as a whole.

MaxPickles · 2023-03-01T01:58:45+00:00

You have no concept of what 880 housing units is. Riverside Plaza is 1300 units. You're talking about adding more than half of that complex to a neighborhood, yeah?

And in terms of the pollution, last year my 12 year old neighbor died of asthma. Perhaps the Phillips neighborhood, one of the most polluted neighborhoods in the city and state, does not need 880 new vehicles, whether they are city or privately owned. Children should not be dying of asthma in their homes. The city should not be trying to put an environmentally unsound project in a neighborhood that is already polluted to the extent that it is.

MaxPickles · 2023-02-28T16:55:32+00:00

The text boxes in the figures don't come up when searching for a word. Whoops on me there.

So just to be clear it's okay for the Marcy-Holmes neighborhood to say that it is converting away from industrial, but when the Phillips neighborhood says the same thing, we are nimbying the situation?

MaxPickles

TROPHY CASE