The Minneapolis Parks System is famous across the country, but it was never finished. The original planners, including noted landscape architect Horace Cleveland, included a complete circle of hiking and biking pathways that circumnavigated the City of Lakes.
The ribbon of parks and parkways loops around the edge of the city as planned until it gets to Northeast Minneapolis. Then it just stops at St. Anthony Boulevard and Ridgeway Parkway. Somehow, it needs to be extended three miles, either south to the University of Minnesota or west to Boom Island to finally forge the Grand Rounds "missing link".
"We need to close the missing link," Hennepin County Commissioner Peter McLaughlin told reporters and park supporters, "and I always took my cues from Walter Dziedzic who always said 'You know the problem with the Grand Rounds is they're not round and we're gonna fix that'."
Monday morning, a group of Minnesota's top federal, state and local officials met on Ridgeway Parkway to begin pedaling a serious campaign to complete Cleveland's dream.
There is no simple solution. If the route heads toward the U of M, the land is industrial. If a Boom Island direction is chosen, the greenway would cut a path through residential neighborhoods. Either way, the undetermined expense will be in the millions of dollars.
Fortunately for supporters, the Chair of the U.S. House of Representatives Transportation Committee happens to be avid bicyclist and Minnesotan James Oberstar.
"There are funds available," Oberstar told Kare11's Allen Costantini, "under the Congestion Mitigation Air Quality Improvement Program, under the Enhancements Program, under the Surface Transportation Program. It's a partnership, 80 percent federal and 20 percent non-Federal. Part of that's to come from the State of Minnesota."
Although he chose not to speak, Minnesota Senate Majority Leader Larry Pogemiller attended the news conference wearing bike shorts and a helmet, as did Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak.
Either route would connect Northeast Minneapolis to southern sections of the city, but "going green" costs "green". Aside from actual money, some property, possibly including homes, would have to be demolished, especially if Boom Island is the chosen connection point.
Still, Oberstar believes it is time to switch from Mideast oil to bicycle oil. He posed the question to those present. "Do you want to continue burning eight barrels of oil a year or do you want to burn 86,000 calories a year on the seat of a bicycle? Do you want to convert from the hydrocarbon economy to the carbohydrate economy? And that's what we're going to do with the Grand Rounds."
Next for the project are eight months of citizen input to agree on a route, then an expected five years or more of construction.
Monday's news conference was simply wheel's up on a very long road to a finished parkway system.
(Copyright 2007 by KARE. All Rights Reserved.)
