A Hotel In Excelsior

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Excelsior at sunrise. Photo by Al Whitaker, Excelsior's Amateur Photographer Laureate

Excelsior at sunrise. Photo by Al Whitaker, Excelsior’s Amateur Photographer Laureate

I grew up in Excelsior, Minnesota. Even so, I’ve been writing this blog for just over a year and have not yet dedicated a post specifically to any Excelsior going-on. For those not familiar with the town, it is an increasingly anomalous holdover in the American townscape and its past is a storied one. Excelsior was once a regional and even national attraction for summer vacationers back when electric streetcars were common – you know, like 110 years ago. Although the town is settled just 17 miles west of Minneapolis on the southwest shore of Lake Minnetonka, it began as an indisputably remote resort town. Edina, St. Louis Park, Hopkins, and Minnetonka were all blips in the landscape on the train ride from the Twin Cities. Excelsior is now lodged firmly in Suburbia, but has remained mostly true to its roots. The town is an authentic Mainstreet USA sort of place and although many small and historic cabin homes have become teardowns, McMansions are still rare within the city limits.

The site in question before demolition. Google hasn't been in town for a while.

The site in question before demolition. Google hasn’t been through town for a while.

There is a large piece of prime real estate in town; extremely valuable real estate that is sitting vacant across the street from Excelsior Bay. It is nestled between the end of Water Street, Excelsior’s main business strip and its thriving commercial core, and the foot of the town’s large and charming charter boat pier. This spot has been an empty grass lot ever since a 1970′s-era strip mall building was torn down a few years ago. The owner of the property refused to renew the leases of the “Pizza Hut building” in hopes of eventually landing a far more lucrative development. It was shortly after demolition that the idea of a hotel started to be murmured about town.

There are two warring forces in Excelsior: the development-minded and the preservation-minded. Although most Excelsiorites are decent and reasonable people, the flying accusations would give Congress a run for its money. The development-minded paint the other side as progress-stifling NIMBY’s while the preservation-minded mark the other side as Starbucks-courting yuppies. As is true with most controversies, the epithets are (mostly) false and the best solution can be found somewhere in the middle.

Geographically, Excelsior is a very small town. It inhabits only 0.63 square miles of land, and its population has dwindled from 2,397 in 2008 to 2,188 in 2011. The aggravation caused by Excelsior’s small tax base is made even worse by resentments toward adjacent townships. The residents of these more suburban-style cities benefit from Excelsior’s amenities and attractions without paying in for their upkeep, while their governing bodies barely provide as much as a real sidewalk or two in their own municipalities. Excelsior’s small size makes it difficult to compete in the terms that have become common in the American landscape: its 0.63 square miles of land can not contain enough Olive Gardens and Walgreens to meet its expenses while these same attractions can be found anywhere else that one may wish to drive to. Excelsior must carefully manage its resources, and its most valuable resource is authenticity.

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Dreaming of The 7th Street Mall

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A quick candid photo taken on typical Fall evening on Nicollet Mall.

Nicollet Mall is the best part of Minneapolis. If not, it is definitely the best part of downtown. It is the best example of successful urbanism that we have, and its close proximity to the Minneapolis Convention Center has redeemed the reputation of the city for countless reluctant visitors. To readers of this blog it will be obvious why this is. The sidewalks are wide. Really wide. Cars are not allowed; only busses, taxis, bicycles, skateboards, pedi-cabs, pedal pubs, segways, push carts, food trucks, farmer’s markets, snowman floats, horse carriages, police, and ambulances are allowed. The Mall is full of sculptures and trees and planters and is almost always pleasant. Forget the Mall of America, if you are trying to impress visitors bring them to Nicollet Mall.

Lately I’ve been thinking that Minneapolis needs more of this. The human-scale vibrancy that can be found on Nicollet Mall is quickly lost any more than a block or two away from the Mall. Except for the occasional uninitiated out-of-towner, it is generally understood that Nicollet Mall is intended for accommodating and transporting humans, not cars. As downtown Minneapolis reaches toward its goal of doubling it resident population, cars will enjoy less of a priority and many more people will be on foot going about their tasks. This is why more space for people will become necessary as Minneapolis becomes a more human oriented city.

Hennepin Avenue seems like the most obvious candidate for this transformation, and it could use the work. However, I have a vision in my head of a large car-less intersection in the middle of the city, preferably with streetcars (but I’ll keep dreaming on that one). So, for my hypothetical study I need to find a street that runs perpendicular to Nicollet Mall and whose buildings could accommodate tenants that contribute to street-level pleasantness. I took a walk yesterday to scope out where I would put my “Cross-street Mall”. I eventually decided on 7th Street, which happens to be the corner of Nicollet that the Crystal Court rests on (which has been coming up a lot lately, maybe my shrink will sort that out for me 20 years from now).

I chose 7th Street simply because it seemed most plausible, or rather, least implausible. I like that it starts at the Target Center and First Avenue (the club, not the avenue), and that it ends roughly where the new Vikings stadium will be. It’s kind of like our own little Avenue des Champs-Élysées, only with more skyways.

The intersection of Hennepin and 7th. Block E at the forefront and the legendary First Avenue club in the back left.

Looking at the map above, 7th Street seems perfect, especially if I am to continue my Classical design metaphor. What I really want is to see what would happen if an American city shut off a street to cars every 4 blocks, but 7th Street will work for now. Making 7th Street car-less will give Minneapolis a sort of ciclovia cardo and decumanus. The intersection of Nicollet and 7th would become the commercial center of downtown. This is a convenient intersection to develop, especially considering that Mike Hicks recently pointed it out as the completely insufficient busiest transit stop in the state.

The Nicollet Mall intersection is in the back with the green awnings. The busiest transit stop in the state is behind that truck.

In its present condition there is not much sidewalk presence on 7th Street, but if it were given the wide sidewalks of Nicollet Mall and amenable transit stops there are many opportunities for pleasant and welcoming storefronts. The latest I’ve heard is that the empty Block E building is slated to become oodles of office space, which I honestly don’t think will be a bad thing. Maybe, if there is a 7th Street Mall, the ground floor will even be subdivided to accommodate organically developed independent businesses (which is the only real way a downtown district can thrive).

The Crystal Court, 40 years later

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With cold weather coming soon, it’s a good time to talk about indoor spaces. While thumbing through my old copy of William H. Whyte’s The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces I came across his glowing review of Minneapolis’ Crystal Court. Whyte is not particularly kind to indoor spaces, but he can’t seem to say enough good things in his book about Yogurt Lab’s current residence.

Photograph of Crystal Court from “The Social Life of Small Urban Spaces”

When Urban Spaces was published, Philip Johnson’s IDS Center had been towering over the Foshay for only 8 years. The snarky blogger inside of me has wanted to be critical of the Crystal Court for a long time, but I could never find enough fault with it to pass judgment. William Whyte praises the court for its highly visible connection to the street, its amount of seating, and its diversity of patrons and uses. For these reasons he makes the assertion that the Crystal Court is the best indoor space in the country, circa 1980. Compared to Whyte’s other examples of corporate-sponsored indoor public spaces, the Crystal Court is stellar. Its vast Modernism and bladder-inducing water feature, traits of the court that irk me, are given a pass by Whyte. Truth be told, the Crystal Court does manage to stay somewhat lively at most times, despite its cavernous qualities and its ever-progressing age. Whyte’s analysis credits the open flow and transparency of the entrances as major factors of the Crystal Court’s success. He spends a considerable number of paragraphs describing the downfalls of revolving doors, but fails to note that the Crystal Court employs them heavily, although that is a small matter.

A professor of mine liked to say that a test of whether a space is public or private is to lift up a camera and start snapping pictures. The quickness of security guards telling you to stop will help inform you to the degree of ownership that the public has in that space. This test is interesting because a camera will make it a long way through the Minneapolis skyway system (I’ve tested it) but is not likely to last long in the County office towers. For fun, he would conduct this test in outdoor shopping centers – always to disastrous results.

Ownership is an important point in regards to the Crystal Court because I would not be able to tell you who owns it if I were asked. In fact, now that I consider the IDS Center to be part of my neighborhood, I have the same sense of rapport whooshing in to the Crystal Court as I do when walking in to the lobby of my own building. It’s comfortable and very rarely do I feel like I am not supposed to be there. I’ve known many architects that will defend Modernism to their graves, and in this case Mr. Johnson may have gotten it right.

The Crystal Court as it exists today. Knowing Modernists’ disdain for curtains and blinds, I wonder how Philip Johnson would react to that flag.

Metrodome Redemption?

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I finally took a moment to google the new Vikings stadium proposal while brushing my teeth this morning. I realize that the rendering HKS offered as their design concept is nothing close to what will end up being built, but I figured it might provide some insight in to what we will eventually get. I am generally optimistic regarding what will happen east of downtown in the coming years. All things considered, and budget politics aside, it could have been a much worse outcome. The stadium will stay in Minneapolis and smart growth policies are far better received now than when the Metrodome was originally built.

It looks like HKS doesn’t plan on spurring any development around their stadium.

That being said, this concept rendering doesn’t provide much hope for design-driven urbanistic development in the vicinity of the stadium. It also appears that Minneapolis is due for a dreary post-apocalyptic future (and a completely different skyline). Fortunately, Mayor R.T. Rybak seems intent on building a city over the giant parking lot surrounding the Metrodome before that ultimate fate comes upon us.

Although I labeled the Metrodome as a cancer yesterday, it doesn’t have to be. Target Field, for example, is slowly integrating wonderfully in to the downtown fabric, and I believe it will prove to be a major catalyst in the eventual flourishing of the North Loop neighborhood. The same can not be said for the Metrodome’s history.  Somewhere out there is a photo of many more buildings surrounding the Metrodome in the year that it was built than exist now. I’ve spend 20 minutes looking for it and that’s all I am going to do.(Please tell me if you know where to find it) 

Regardless, this is a present-day aerial photo and it doesn’t need much explanation. The rotting of the city emanating out from the Metrodome is not necessarily the building’s fault, although the building is certainly ugly; it is the fault of decades of stupid land-use and transportation policies. In that same vein, I don’t care so much about the actual design of the stadium. The eventual design is important in the way in which it integrates in to the neighborhood, and American stadiums (especially football stadiums) have a bad record with good design. A hideous, inward-looking stadium will seem a nefarious presence in any neighborhood looking to thrive. For the time being, however, I am much more concerned with what happens around the stadium, and with the policies that cause it.

Minneapolis has plenty of room to grow, as is easy to see above, and it will have to grow if doubling the downtown population is to come true. Washington Avenue is already seeing quite a bit of development along the riverfront and is ripe to keep moving along. Now we need some diversity of use to break through the wall of office buildings cordoning off vibrancy (and buildings) from expanding to the east. A policy of density surrounding the new stadium will help to usher that in.

For real this time; aka “a quick life update”

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I set out writing this blog unsure of whether I wanted to write with a more personal or professional approach. Lately, it seems, I have settled on not writing much of anything at all. The last time I wrote it was early summer and I was preparing to make the move with my girlfriend across the country to be closer to her family and friends. For varied reasons the move got postponed, we signed a lease together downtown, and I am jealous every day of her commute across the street to Target headquarters. We found out yesterday that she passed the bar and is now officially a lawyer; I couldn’t be more proud of her.

I am still working in St. Louis Park doing primarily commercial buildings, some of which really excites me and some of which pays the bills. I am officially car-less and have a great bike commute in which I pedal through Loring Park, over the yellow and blue bridge, past the Spoonbridge with Cherry, and then on wooded bike trails all the way to my office. With the cold weather coming I need to find a few good books for the bus after my bike gets hung up for the season.

With any luck, this blog will be much more active than it has been over the summer. I enjoy the opportunity it gives me to write out my scattered thoughts in to coherent arguments. So without any further ado, here’s some more Walk Bike Bus.

…And I’m back.

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I have been on blogging hiatus over the summer. The last time I wrote I explained that I was planning on making the move to D.C. in the immediate future. As life would have it, the move was not written for us at this point in our lives, but things are working out. My wonderful girlfriend has taken a job with Target headquarters and I have been offered a salaried position at my office. Slowly but surely, it seems as if we will eventually graduate to adulthood after all.

I have also had a hard time mustering blog posts because I felt like a fraud. I spent the summer commuting by car for half an hour. Each way. Every day. The shame. I know. Now, however, I am fully moved in to an eighth-story apartment in the heart of downtown Minneapolis, bike or bus to work, and am inspired every day by an exciting urban environment that in my opinion just keeps getting better.

I have had a few thoughts over the summer that I would like to develop further in to full blog posts, and I am excited to get my thinking cap back on. When I started this blog in January it gave me an excuse to meet with a lot of people that I would otherwise not have, and it gave me a vehicle to explore the things that really interest me, whether or not my professional life happened to intersect. More than anything, I am excited to get back in to that mode. So, look out for some new Walk Bike Bus, it’s coming!