At left, Minneapolis Public Works Director Tim Sexton and project manager Kelsey Fogt greet participants at the Hennepin Avenue open house. Right, visitors to the Hennepin Avenue open house shared their vision for the corridor, writing wishes on sticky notes and voting with dot stickers. On the honor system, each participant could take up to two dots to vote on options ranging from bike lanes to parking. When this photo was taken, off-street bike lanes had drawn a cluster of dots, and parking spaces had none. (Images: Craig Wilson)
The City of Minneapolis has stopped pretending. The 2018 reconstruction of Hennepin Avenue between Lake Street and 31st Street, which removed all parking and put two unprotected five-foot bike lanes in the street, has few fans left on any side, and Public Works now says so out loud.
“It’s really not safe for bikes and it’s not working for the businesses,” Public Works Director Tim Sexton told me at a Sept. 23 open house at Walker Library. “It doesn’t seem like it’s doing a great job of anything, and it’s actually creating a safety hazard.”
The fix comes in two parts: a quick restriping with paint this fall, within weeks, and a full rebuild of the block, plus Lake Street from Hennepin to Humboldt Avenue South, with construction anticipated in 2028.
“It doesn’t seem like it’s doing a great job of anything, and it’s actually creating a safety hazard.”
— Tim Sexton, Director, Minneapolis Public Works
“We tried something out there, and really huge kudos to the team for trying something really ambitious,” Sexton said. “I think it’s OK that we recognize now maybe it didn’t work as we thought it would.”
Nobody Defends It
Sexton is a biker himself, rides the block daily and went straight to the case for cyclists: The bike lane is blocked constantly. Project manager Kelsey Fogt said the same. “That’s the thing that we experience a lot,” she said.
I told them I bike, walk and drive through the same block, and that it is dangerous for drivers, too. Someone double-parks in the bike lane, flips on the blinkers and runs into a store. The rest of us swerve into oncoming traffic to get around them.
One attendee pointed out that the whole thing was designed before mobile deliveries and curbside pickups turned every curb in the city into a loading zone. Even former Council President Lisa Bender, who championed the design, has reportedly acknowledged that it didn’t work.
When I asked where the push came from, staff, the council or the mayor, Sexton looked less comfortable. He said that the department had heard plenty from the community, and he credited the mayor with asking staff to think creatively about Uptown. “Many of us were here when Uptown was different, a bit more vibrant,” he said.
Paint Now, Curbs Later
The good news is that the city is not waiting. Fogt said the interim fix will be installed in September or October, “weeks, not months.” It will rework the lanes with paint and, in the city’s words, provide curbside space for loading, unloading and possibly metered parking, “helping reduce conflicts at the curb.” Exactly how the bike lane, the travel lanes and a parking or loading zone will be divided was not spelled out, and that is the detail worth watching.
What the interim fix will not do is move the curbs. Sexton said that gets expensive fast because of the utilities and areaways beneath the sidewalks. His three goals: Keep it cheap, keep it low-disruption, and collect data on what works.
The permanent project comes later, pending grants and other funding. The project will likely include more room for people walking and rolling, a two-way protected bikeway on Hennepin replacing the current lanes, a new protected bikeway on Lake and permanent curbside space for loading and metered parking. That last piece is what businesses have been asking for.
Who Showed Up
I found out about the open house less than a week before it happened, and only because City Council Member Elizabeth Shaffer’s newsletter mentioned it.
No one notified the Hill & Lake Press. Ward 7 staff told me they heard about it only recently and popped it into the newsletter.
That might explain the turnout. Somewhere between two and three dozen people, depending on who was counting, had come through by the time I left, 45 minutes in. Most participants looked young and, from the conversations I overheard, were there to advocate for bicycling and transit. A couple of older people stood out asking about parking and whether the block would be viable for businesses.
I didn’t see a single business owner. When I asked staff whether the businesses had been notified, they assured me they had door knocked on the corridor the week before.
“The design will only reflect the voices that get into the record.”
— Tim Sexton, Director, Minneapolis Public Works
Council Member Shaffer’s Ward 7 staff were there. The block itself sits in Ward 10, and staff said they expected Council Member Aisha Chughtai to arrive later in the evening. She had not by the time I left; I later heard that she was at a Board of Estimate and Taxation meeting.
Your Turn
The feedback exercise was low-tech: sticky notes and dots on boards, marking what mattered most to us. With a few dozen people in the room, the boards drew a handful of comments, which leaned heavily toward the bicycle and pedestrian experience. The parking-and-business concerns of those two people were in the minority.
That is not a complaint about the people who came. They showed up, and the city heard them. It is a note to everyone who didn’t. Sticky notes and dots are a crude instrument, but they are the record the city will carry into the design phase, and right now that record is thin.
The good news is that the process is just getting started. The interim striping comes this fall, and the city will get to see how it works before the permanent design is settled. Fogt said the team expects to return early next year with more detail on that plan, and she promised to connect anyone who reaches out with the right people.
“Regardless, it’s hopefully going to be a win for the businesses on those blocks,” said one longtime observer of City Hall who was in the room. “At least you can park a truck there and get your stuff off the back.”
If you have opinions on this block — and everyone who uses it does — check out the project page at minneapolismn.gov/government/projects/he-nepin-lake-improvements, which has contact information and a sign-up for updates.
Shop owners, delivery people, pedestrians, people who ride the block and people who drive it: The design will reflect only the voices that get into the record.
This time, don’t wait for a newsletter.
Craig Wilson is the editor of the Hill & Lake Press. He lives in Lowry Hill.
