Twin Citian

June 24, 2022

On 6/17/2022 at 9:40 AM, Melrose said:

Chicago (Minneapolis too) bailed out on their bid because of FIFA's pretty aggressive demands for tax and other financial concessions as part of the bids, which is something I don't think has been discussed....

https://www.newsobserver.com/news/business/article262551862.html

I think these are notable to point out because these concessions certainly cut against certain categories of positive "economic impact" you would hope to see.....

Chicago, Minneapolis, Montreal, and Phoenix (Glendale) withdrew from the selection process.

April 16, 2021

20 hours ago, Binbin98 said:

What about the most racist city in America thread?

Enjoy your coming decades of economic decline!! Cities like Austin, Nashville, Raleigh and Miami will least racist corrupt cities like Minneapolis and St. Paul in the dust.

Hahahaha. Do you have any legit sources to back up your ridiculous comment? For starters, racism exists everywhere my friend and none of the cities / metros you mentioned are free of it.

As far as the economy of the Twin Cities collapsing is concerned, it's very unlikely. I'm also confident that it will be decades before, perhaps never that the likes of Austin, Nashville, or Raleigh surpass Minneapolis in terms of economic importance. As a matter of fact, Minneapolis - St. Paul surpasses them in so many other areas, that it's laughable. Regarding Miami, well it underperforms for a metro of its size and has plenty glaring issues of its own.

Nice try though.

February 13, 2019

On 2/5/2019 at 1:03 PM, SydneyCarton said:

Thanks. I haven't been to Minneapolis for years. I like it there but couldn't take the climate. Anyway, I thought that Brooks Brothers, etc had closed too. The fact that there's a big mall is irrelevant. Charlotte has a big, fancy mall even closer to its downtown.

You're right. It's not relevant at all - just look at all the shopping options Uptown has to offer. /s Anyway, SouthPark is nowhere the draw that the MOA is. BTW, there is another mall just outside of downtown Minneapolis, Rosedale Center, which is about the same distance South Park is from Uptown (~5 to 7 miles). Southdale and the Galleria are also close to downtown MPLS (~8 or 9 miles). These places have played a large role in sucking the life out of downtown areas.

February 5, 2019

On 2/4/2019 at 11:06 AM, SydneyCarton said:

Downtown Minneapolis tried to create a very nice, high-end retail street, and it was a huge failure. Most of the stores have closed.

Nicollet Mall was never meant to be a high-end only retail street. Also, most of the stores that have closed have either gone out of business or have closed hundreds of stores nationwide. There is still a Nordstrom Rack, Saks Off 5th, the flagship Target, Brooks Brothers, Allen Edmonds, Banana Republic, a number of boutique stores, etc... As someone already pointed out, having the or one the largest malls in the US ten miles away doesn't help.

July 15, 2018

6 hours ago, ricky_davis_fan_21 said:

My general pessimism toward this project is 1. It’s huge size, similar concept as Stonewall Station but even taller and 2. The fact Lennar already downsized a similar project significantly in Minneapolis.

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

The downsizing of the MPLS project might have to due with the fact that Lennar just completed a 20-story high-rise next to the downsized proposal. There is also a 26-story apartment currently being built across the street from the proposed project, another 26-story project just broke ground and a 42-story project is about to break ground; both are within a short walking distance. Also, their downsized proposal now consisting of 5 and 12-story buildings will fully utilize the lot. Their original proposal was 30ish story building with a massive parking ramp that would have only utilized 1/3 of the lot.

May 31, 2018

On 5/30/2018 at 11:19 AM, Jernigan said:

Assuming the last few posts reference Kissimmee and not just our other sprawl....consider:

Minneapolis to St Paul - 11 miles

Orlando to Kissimmee - 22 miles

Dallas to Fort Worth - 30 miles

Twin cities baby. Connected by rail no less.

(insert “it’s happening!” Meme here)

Major difference here is that Minneapolis and St. Paul literally border one another; there aren't suburbs or boundaries separating them. The Target Field light rail station on the western edge of downtown MPLS is only 12.5 miles from the Union Depot on the eastern edge of downtown STP.

March 20, 2018

On 3/19/2018 at 4:34 PM, AirNostrumMAD said:

I see our other notable competitor isn’t on that list. Austin.

Austin scores sometimes, Charlotte scores others, then Nashville has its times too. We hosted the DNC. We have light rail. We’re on certain short list at times. It all equals out.

Detroit, Portland, Tampa, Minneapolis, Phoenix are among others left out.

Neither Minneapolis nor Phoenix were left out, they pulled out of the running as did Chicago and Vancouver. FIFA officials were trying to pull some b.s. (i.e. asking to bypass labor laws) and the MPLS bidding committee said no thanks, which I fully support. Charlotte, Las Vegas, SLC, and Tampa were cut; resident and city officials should be relieved.

I hope other cities will follow suit.

Chicago, Minneapolis, Arizona drop World Cup bid, blast FIFA.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireStory/chicago-minneapolis-drop-world-cup-bid-blast-fifa-53782785

FIFA's Requirements

http://www.fieldofschemes.com/2018/03/16/13565/chicago-minneapolis-vancouver-drop-out-of-world-cup-bid-rather-than-grant-fifa-a-decade-long-tax-exemption/

January 27, 2018

17 hours ago, PHofKS said:

I'm still puzzled over why they chose Nashville over Charlotte which has the much larger airport and probably a larger pool of tech people to supply as workers for Amazon. It also has an ambitious mass transit program ongoing and expanding. Charlotte seems to check a lot of boxes, that may be problematical for Nashville.

Without getting into a City vs. City debate, what does Nashville offer that Charlotte doesn't? I've always seen Charlotte as a New York style city and Nashville as a Los Angeles type of city. Is Bezos looking for a certain lifestyle in a city? Nashville, Austin and Denver seem to provide a different living experience for it's residents with a little wider variety of options in entertainment (Nashville, Austin), outdoor activity (Denver).

But one compelling factor that may have tipped Nashville into the finals is that it, along with Denver and Austin, is a State Capitol. That probably is why Raleigh, Columbus, and Indianapolis made the cut, also. It didn't help Minneapolis-St. Paul (too cold) or Salt Lake City (west of Rockies) however. But being close to the center of power in a state may be important than we think.

Trying to find any other pattern of appealing factors in these selections is almost impossible. There seems to be an avoidance of the northern, snowy climes and the sweltering southwestern climes (Houston, Phoenix). Bezos likes the biggest cities as DC gets three spots, NYC gets two and LA is the only west of the Rockies city chosen. The only major cities left out were Detroit, Phoenix and Houston for the above listed reasons.

So either being a big city, plus mild climate and/or power centers seem to be the common factors involved in 19 of the cities on the final list. The odd exception to these factors seems to be Pittsburgh.

Cold weather has little to do with the fact that Minneapolis didn't make the final 20 list. The fact is that Minneapolis and Minnesota didn't offer Amazon billions in incentives to move there. MN Gov. Mark Dayton made it clear that bidding for Amazon would be sending a wrong message to the state's corporate base (~30 Fortune 1000 based companies and a number of large, private companies). If weather were a factor UnitedHealth Group, Cargill, Target, Best Buy, 3M, Ecolab, U.S. Bancorp, General Mills, etc... would have moved shop years ago. In the end Amazon could end up buying Target and Minneapolis becomes another headquarters and gains thousands of jobs in the process -- without ever having to bid billions. Also, Minneapolis is already in much better shape in terms of infrastructure, amenities, entertainment, QOL, etc... than a number of cities that made the top 20.

January 26, 2018

On 1/22/2018 at 12:20 PM, rancenc said:

Me personally, the fact that Toronto is listed raises the prospect of a national tug of war. It is NO secret that our illustrious President Trump has no love for CEO Jeff Bezos. It would not surprise me that Amazon locates their secondary office in Canada.

In terms of the fact that Charlotte was not on the final list, I am definitely not despairing or even second guessing why. A lot of cities such as Minneapolis, San Diego, Houston, Tamp-St Pete, Jacksonville FL, Kansas City MO, St Louis,,,,,were not listed either. I think Charlotte is still ranked and will continued to be ranked high on both headquarters and/or expansion lists!

Neither the Minneapolis area nor Minnesota offered Amazon much. MN Gov. Mark Dayton made it clear that bidding for Amazon would be sending a wrong message to the state's ~30 Fortune 1000 based companies, including Target and Best Buy, as well as every other business entity. It will be interesting to see how this plays out though. as Amazon may end up buying Target and perhaps one or two other Minneapolis area-based companies. Minneapolis could end up losing thousands of jobs or becoming another headquarters and gaining thousands of jobs.

October 27, 2017

5 hours ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

I walked all around downtown Minneapolis between 12pm-4pm and it was dead on a 60F or so sunny day on Wednesday. It felt much less busy than uptown.

Downtown MPLS is over 3 sq miles so if you're walking in certain areas like downtown east (US Bank Stadium , HCMC, government area) or downtown west (the central business district) at certain times, it will seem dead.

October 27, 2017

9 hours ago, CLT2014 said:

Skyway season has kicked off in Siberia. But really, I just agree to disagree. I think Minneapolis is overrated from a downtown standpoint and agree with the other poster who mentioned blank walls. I'm not saying Charlotte is better, I just think Minneapolis is in a similar position to cities like Charlotte, Atlanta, Houston, etc... that are trying to make their downtown more vibrant, as opposed to cities that have really strong downtowns (Seattle, San Francisco, Boston, Washington DC, etc....) Often times people talk about Minneapolis like it belongs in the bucket with places like San Francisco rather than cities that still have a lot of work to do. The reality is its peers are probably Nashville and Austin - cities where the downtown has a leg up on Houston or Dallas, but still far behind the top tier of downtowns in the country.

I agree cities like Boston, San Francisco and Seattle have stronger downtown areas than Minneapolis and they should -- they are big tourist towns. However, even downtown Seattle and San Francisco where I occasionally work have dead zones that are not welcoming at all. Downtown MPLS falls between Seattle and the likes of Austin and Nashville, but it still offers quite a bit more than the latter two in terms of amenities, connectivity, etc... There are also a lot more people living within a 1 mile radius of downtown MPLS's core (CBD) than there are near Austin's and Nashville's (2010 Census: 32,678 vs 18,086 and 6,147) so that's an obvious a benefit.

Not sure where you're going with the weather angle, but Minneapolis, Boston, Seattle, and a number of other cities have sh*ttier weather than Charlotte and well, they are way ahead of Charlotte in a number of areas.

October 26, 2017

4 hours ago, go_vertical said:

The untrained eye would swear that first picture was Charlotte. Thankfully we have noticeably more foot traffic.

Actually, nowhere in Uptown Charlotte has as much foot traffic as this area normally does. Nicollet Mall, which you can see is fenced off, has been closed since 2015 and has been a deadzone. Also, seeing the lack of cars parked along 7th has me questioning the day and time the photo was taken.

October 26, 2017

4 hours ago, CLT2014 said:

Minneapolis is all about the Skyway. The city is freezing cold. Nobody wants to go for a stroll when it is 15 degrees outside. Outside of special events, Minneapolis doesn't have that bustling of a street life, especially from late fall to early spring, and when I'm there on the weekends it is pretty dead. It is a pretty clean city, educated, and has a good economy, but I've never personally been that impressed.

Here's a good article of locals discussing the issues with the Skyways. There is even a "Skyway Avoidance Society" trying to get people to not use them to revitalize downtown Minneapolis retail.

http://mspmag.com/shop-and-style/don’t-avoid-the-skyway-issue/

I'm pretty familiar with Minneapolis, Charlotte as well as a long list of others. Downtown Minneapolis is far more active than Uptown Charlotte and many other downtown areas. While I'm not a fan of the skyway system, many visitors are, especially during Jan & Feb when it's actually freezing cold and then during the late summer months when it's hot and humid. As far as bustling street life, 98% of US downtown areas are nowhere near bustling so, when you state you are not impressed with downtown MPLS, what cities do you have in mind? Yes, there are special events - almost every night. There are sporting events (NFL, MLB, NBA, & WNBA), concerts, and theaters that draw hundreds of thousands throughout the year. Then there are the establishments along Hennepin and Washington that are a constant draw. Not many downtown areas can consistently draw this many people.

Regarding retail, it's coming back. Nordstom Rack just opened in the IDS Tower and there is speculation that a well-known retailer will be opening in the short-lived Sports Authority space in City Center. Also, it was just announced that the former Macy's building will be turned into a mix of office and "high end" retail -- announcements could be within weeks.

BTW, interesting choice of photos for your narrative. 7th Street (1st photo) and 2nd Ave (2nd photo) are not exactly representative of downtown MPLS. The first photo is the intersection of 7th and Nicollet Mall, which was completely shut down when you took your photo. Since then, Nordstrom Rack has opened in the IDS (upper right) and parts of Nicollet Mall have reopened so the foot traffic is coming back. Your second photo is wall of offices, most of which are government and banking operations; a very 9 - 5 area -- an area that all major downtown areas have.

September 14, 2017

23 hours ago, tarhoosier said:

2/3 of the US population is on or east of the Mississippi. Minneapolis, St. Paul, and St. Louis (plus other sizable cities) are on the west bank.

Sorry, but I just came across this statement and had to correct it. St. Paul is on the east bank of the Mississippi as are the Northeast (13 neighborhoods) and University (six neighborhoods, including the U of M east bank campus) communities of Minneapolis.

August 24, 2017

On ‎8‎/‎17‎/‎2017 at 8:08 AM, GRDadof3 said:

Even large cities like Minneapolis and Charlotte have not expanded beyond their one light rail lines, and they're going on 10 years in service. The cost for infrastructure projects like that have skyrocketed, and although they're cool, you have to wonder if it's the "moral" thing to build when neighborhoods in Grand Rapids and some of the suburbs are in severe need of investments and job growth.

OK I'll get off my coffee-infused soapbox.

Huh? Minneapolis has two light-rail lines; the blue and green lines and the NorthStar commuter line.

April 11, 2017

6 hours ago, caterpillar2 said:

And the state bird is the mosquito.

Outstate MN, yes. Twin Cities area not so much.

April 10, 2017

1 hour ago, edmundblackadder1999 said:

Personally, I think that Minneapolis is a better city than Charlotte. However, I could not endure those eight month winters.

Haha. I don't think anyone would be able to handle eight months of winter.

April 10, 2017

1 hour ago, AirNostrumMAD said:

I think that's why the city was used as a benchmark.

Anyway, the good thing about Charlotte (possibly) getting a retail center is that it will be during a time when it can be built to reflect modern shopping trends. So instead of having a mall built for the past (with say a large anchor like Macy's or Sears) that has failing tenants and leaving large parts of those malls empty, a retail center here could reflect modern times. Maybe the largest anchor being a smaller H&M and such. No Belks or Macy's. Smaller formatted stores. For example Anthropologie is going in SouthEnd. Downtown Greenville has several major retailers. Retail tenants such as Anthropologie, Urban Outfitters, and the fancier places I could totally see working. As opposed to the traditional Macy's old school style malls such as the one in downtown Indy.

That's fine. I was just pointing out that it's not all doom and gloom that some seem to think or are trying to portray. Downtown MPLS is seeing record numbers in terms of residents, office workers, private investment, hotel rooms, etc. and areas like North Loop and Downtown East are doing very well. It will be interesting to see if whether or not Nicollet Mall can recover from the changing retail climate and its recent renovation.

I would think stores like Anthropologie and Urban Outfitters would really struggle in most US downtown areas. Stores like H&M, Nordstrom Rack, Saks Off Fifth, etc.., however, would do well.

April 10, 2017

On 4/6/2017 at 8:23 AM, CLT2014 said:

Nicollet Mall has really gone downhill during the "renovation" that has been nothing more than ripping up the street for two years and re-paving it. Macy's, Barnes and Nobles, the Gap, Office Depot, Jos A Bank, and Sports Authority closed/closing soon leaving large blocks boarded up, several restaurants closed, and the homeless and panhandlers have moved in to occupy most of the benches on the dead streets. Stores are closing by 6PM and many are not open on Sunday.

It will be interesting to see if it makes a turnaround once the construction stops. This review on TripAdvisor was like my experience there in October: "What a disappointment! Stores are closed or vacant retail space. Off fifth and Marshall's dark, depressing and old retail space- absolutely needs new tenants and a facelift. Wow! Avoid at all costs!"

Article about the push to save the Nicollet Mall from declining: http://www.startribune.com/with-nicollet-mall-in-limbo-downtown-landlords-and-tenants-band-together/413501313/

3 out 5 on Yelp: https://www.yelp.com/biz/nicollet-mall-minneapolis
3.5 out of 5 on TripAdvisor: https://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g43323-d144805-Reviews-Nicollet_Mall-Minneapolis_Minnesota.html

While Nicollet Mall has been struggling, the North Loop area of downtown MPLS has been doing very well. Also, in case you haven't noticed, consumer shopping habits have moved online and several retailers are failing, including many that are / were located along Nicollet Mall. Macy's has been closing stores left and right and won't be around in 5 years. The same can be said for Barnes and Noble, the Gap, and Jos A Bank. Sport Authority already filed bankruptcy and closed all stores. Saks Off Fifth is doing okay and I'm sure the new Nordstrom Rack (opening in the old Gap space) will do fine as well, but let's face it, retail is struggling everywhere. As far as restaurants are concerned, they come and go, but there are far more restaurants (and variety) in downtown MPLS now than what there was 5 - 10 years ago. Regarding the homeless and panhandlers, it's not any worse than what one would see in a major city. That said, downtown Minneapolis's retail / restaurant scene is still doing FAR better than the majority of US cities.

April 10, 2017

Here's some skyline porn:

Minneapolis by Logan Selinski, on Flickr

A Northstar at Mpls Jct by Noah Kleinschmidt, on Flickr

Downtown Across the River by Greg Lundgren, on Flickr

minneapolis by Logan Selinski, on Flickr

Downtown East with Cedar-River neighborhood and the U of M West Bank in the background. Most of this area was parking lots 5 - 10 years ago.

Untitled by AboveTheNorm, on Flickr

Minneapolis skyline from NE 3-22-17 by Matt Bappe, on Flickr

photo: IamHenryK

So many additions over the past 10 years.

14076_G by Jamie Hutt, on Flickr

October 27, 2016

It's been a beautiful fall. Here are some photos.

Minneapolis: Dinkytown (U of M) foreground; Stadium Village (U of M) and East Bank campus upper left; West Bank (U of M) and Cedar-Riverside area center; downtown Minneapolis upper right.