Coordination/Collaboration : Development News

Some longtime residents of the Frogtown neighborhood in St. Paul hope to turn a 13-acre vacant lot into a garden and urban farm.

They're envisioning recreational spaces, nature trails, vegetable gardens, picnic areas, and more on the sloping piece of land that has long  served as a sledding hill for community members. 

Patricia Ohmans, a longtime Frogtown resident, says the idea came up a couple of years ago, informally, in a conversation among neighbors about improving the area.

She says that city and U.S. Census data reveals that Frogtown is the neighborhood with the least amount of green space in the city.

Considering that green space is "one of the social determinants of health," she says, "Our neighborhood has been given short shrift."

They're hoping to collaborate with the Wilder Foundation to acquire the property, which the longstanding nonprofit health and human services organization owns. 

Wilder has been forced to sell off some of its property in the economic downturn, she explains.  

Recently the garden advocates drafted a 43-page plan of action, outlining their next steps to make their dream a reality. 

"We're imploring the foundation to hold off on putting this parcel on the market," she says. "We're asking if it would consider a collaboration with neighbors for a funding package that would benefit the foundation and community." 

The idea has garnered plenty of public support, with nearly 200 people showing up for a December community meeting on the topic, according to Ohmans. They've also collected a number of letters of support from elected officials. 

"We think there's a higher good to be served and we think," she says. "It's a very respected old institution in St. Paul and it has done a lot of good over the years. Their slogan is 'Here for Good,' and we hope they mean it." 


Source: Patricia Ohmans, Frogtown Gardens activist
Writer: Anna Pratt

Coming up with inspiring visions for reconnecting the city of Minneapolis to the Mississippi River--one of three great rivers in the world--is no easy task, but that's just what the contestants in the Mississippi Riverfront Design Competition set out to do.

The four finalist teams, which were chosen in November, are competing for a commission to redesign 220 acres of parkland along the Mississippi, starting near the Stone Arch Bridge and pushing the city's northern boundary.  

They presented their plans to an audience of over 400 people at the Walker Art Center last week, while another 200 viewers watched online. A winner will be announced Feb. 10.  

Mary deLaittre, the contest's project manager, who is also the founder and principal of Groundwork City Building, says each design was impressive.

For starters, the New York City-based Ken Smith Workshop's plan "clearly walked people along the river," she says, adding, "That was the strongest element. It gave a clear concept of the parks along the river." 

Boston's Stoss Landscape Urbanism had a clear understanding that "we need to reclaim and redefine the river quickly," while the firm also recognized the importance of marketing and branding the endeavor in unique ways.

Likewise, TLS/KVA out of Berkeley, Calif., "distinguished themselves with an innovative, comprehensive and integrated approach," that included a considerable amount of community engagement.

The group touched on topics such as health, mobility and green economy, educating people about consumer impacts on the river.

Last, Turenscape team members who come from Beijing, China, "really outdid themselves with a quality video that looks at the river over 50 years." 

Although each team was paid $30,000, deLaittre says, individually the teams put in another $250,000 in time, expertise and production--hard work that will have lasting value. 

Video footage of their presentations can be seen on the project website, where there's also a form for submitting feedback.

The Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board and Minneapolis Parks Foundation cosponsored the contest along with creative partners, the Walker Art Center and University of Minnesota College of Design.
 

Source: Mary deLaittre, project manager, Mississippi Riverfront Design Competition and founder and principal for Groundwork City Building 
Writer: Anna Pratt

As a part of the 25th annual Search for Shelter Charrette through the Minnesota chapter of the American Institute of Architects (AIA), a group of architects and designers will come up with design solutions to address various affordable housing and homelessness issues. 

The workshop at the University of Minnesota's College of Design, which goes from Feb. 11 to 13, is the only one of its kind throughout the AIA network, according to event information.

Jacquelyn Peck, a Minnesota AIA representative, explains that about 50 volunteer architects, landscape and interior designers, and students who turn out for the weekend will break into eight-person teams. The teams are then individually assigned to a handful of different projects. 

Nonprofit organizations apply to participate in the event through a competitive process, she says.  

The event includes opening remarks from Minnesota chapter president Steve Fiskum, a panel discussion with area housing experts, and presentations from the selected nonprofits. 

Afterward, teams meet with nonprofits to go over more details. They spend the day visiting sites, developing designs, and creating accompanying images. To help the nonprofits get going on the projects, "We give them a weekend of intense design, with boards and images," Peck says.

She describes the event as a springboard to "get [nonprofits'] ideas down into something tangible so they can talk about it and educate others with."

On Sunday at noon, the teams present their work as part of a program that's open to the public.     
 
Past projects have centered on everything from connecting scattered affordable housing sites to remodeling homeless-shelter lobbies.

One project that has been a success, starting off at the design charrette in 2008, is the revamped facility for YouthLink, which provides services to homeless youth. "They took images and got funding to do the remodeling and addition work," Peck says, adding, that the facility re-opened a few months ago.  


Source: Jacquelyn Peck, representative of the Minnesota chapter of the American Institute of Architects
Writer: Anna Pratt

The state's largest affordable-housing complex will soon undergo a considerable rehab.

Funding for a project to revamp Riverside Plaza in Minneapolis's Cedar-Riverside neighborhood closed on Jan. 5 while construction could begin next month.  

The modernist 11-building campus, which renowned architect Ralph Rapson designed in the 1970s, has 4,440 residents, plus a charter school, grocery store, and tenant resource center, according to city information.

Matt Goldstein, who works in the city's housing division, says that getting the finances lined up is a huge accomplishment on its own. 

A complicated $132 million deal restructures the property's debt and finances a $62 million renovation that includes $7 million for site and common-area improvements, according to city information.

Notably, 88 percent of the project's funding comes from private sources, he says.   

Goldstein explains that the rehab comes out of necessity. The heating and cooling system had started to go, which could leave a whole building without heat. As such, "The vast majority of work is being done behind the walls," he says.  

Otherwise, the building could become uninhabitable and would "create an amazing burden on shelters and other available housing stock," he says, adding that there is no money to acquire the property and tear down the building.   
 
For the city, the bottom line is about extending the building's lifespan and "enhancing the quality of life for these residents," he says. "The comprehensive nature of the renovation does that."  

Other goals of the project are to increase safety on the campus, improve energy efficiency, and better provide for pedestrians and bicycles. The city also pushed for a workforce plan that creates 200 construction jobs, with 90 spots reserved for neighborhood residents.

Goldstein is hopeful about the project's potential impact on the area.

The renovation is aligned with several other projects, Goldstein explains. The nearby Cedars, also a large affordable-housing complex, will soon be revamped, while planning for the neighborhood's Central Corridor Light Rail stop is underway, along with additional streetscape improvements.   

It's part of a conscientious effort to make the developments work together. "The Riverside Plaza project isn't happening in a vacuum," says Goldstein.

Source: Matt Goldstein, Housing Division for Minneapolis
Writer: Anna Pratt

St. Paul city officials, community members, and other stakeholders are mulling over ideas to help preserve, restore, and improve Indian Mounds Regional Park. A 20-member task force will present plans at an open house this week. 

The century-old Indian Mounds Regional Park, in the Dayton's Bluff neighborhood, is a segment of the Battle Creek Regional Park, according to city information.

Indian Mounds Park has a history as a sacred Indian burial ground going back 2,000 years, starting with the Hopewell culture. Later the area was sacred to the Dakota Indians. Only six of at least 37 original mounds still exist today.

The park hasn't been updated much since the 1970s, according to parks spokesperson Brad Meyer.  

Meyer says the planning process dovetails with a larger visioning effort that's underway, including the Great River Park Plan, which is about making the St. Paul riverfront more natural, more urban, and more connected, project materials state.  

The Great River plan will outline where the city's parks will be in 25 years, Meyer says. In the future,Indian Mounds Park could have volleyball and bocce ball courts, gateway features, and a garden, for instance.

Other ideas are for a dog park, tennis courts, exercise stations, and a revamped amphitheater, according to project materials. Some mounds may be relocated, while native plantings would help restore the prairie.  

The core idea is that Indian Mounds is a destination park, with a lot of potential for becoming a unique place, Meyer says, adding that it's "a significant step into the future of what could be another premium park."  
    
The plan will move to the City Council in February before heading to the Metropolitan Council.
 

Source: Brad Meyer, St. Paul parks public information officer
Writer: Anna Pratt

HOME Line, a Minneapolis-based nonprofit tenant advocacy organization that has a hotline offering free legal advice to renters, recently set out to collect more information about the results of its work.

Fortunately, the organization had kept tabs on things going back to 1992.

HOME Line housing attorney Samuel Spaid worked with a University of Minnesota statistician, Craig Rolling, to analyze data from a sampling of only about 10 percent of callers, who most frequently described difficulties related to home repairs, evictions, security deposits, foreclosures, and breaking leases. The hotline gets about 11,000 calls a year. 

They learned the organization had helped many more people save money and avoid eviction than they had previously imagined. "We were massively under-reporting the impact of services," says Spaid. "It changed the way we look at what we're doing."   

They presented their findings at a housing forum last month from the Center for Urban and Regional Affairs at the University of Minnesota. 

Through a mathematical formula that accounted for calls similar to the sample population, they discovered that through the years HOME Line has been instrumental in landing $5.4 million in security deposit money and $10 million in rent abatements while preventing 8,700 evictions. The old figures hardly came close; the organization previously reported $500,000 saved in security deposits and $740,000 in rent abatements and 2,851 prevented evictions.

For renters in buildings that were being foreclosed on--a growing problem--the number-crunching indicates that tenants who stayed put after the 6-month redemption period collectively saved $4.19 million from 2006 to 2010.  

Many renters don't know that they can linger in a building undergoing foreclosure, often for up to nine months, Spaid explains. During that time, renters usually pay little or no rent. "The fact that they were able to recoup some losses was surprising," he says.    

Eighty percent of tenants who followed through on HOME Line's suggestions got repairs made. In fact, half of the people who merely sent landlords a form letter got some money back. Those who didn't take their advice got no money back.   

Overall, renters have saved $15.4 million by following through on HOME Line's advice, compared to the $1.2 million it put out there before. 

The information puts the organization in a good position for giving advice going forward. "We're able to tell what likely outcomes are and say, 'this is what someone should do and why,'" he says.


Source: Samuel Spaid, Housing Attorney at HOME Line
Writer: Anna Pratt

A 2.6-acre parcel in the heart of the storied Crocus Hill area in St. Paul has long been underused, says developer Ellen Brown, who has a plan to turn it around.     

Brown, who has often been a consultant to the city and the St. Paul Foundation on development issues, is partnering with Dick Zehring, the owner of MSP Commercial in St. Paul, on a proposal for an upscale condo complex for 180 S. Grotto St.

She and Zehring have entered into a purchase agreement with the Amherst H. Wilder Foundation, which they're scheduled to close on in the spring.

On the site, the Wilder Foundation previously operated the Bush Memorial Children's Center, a residential treatment program for troubled youth. Following recent budget cuts, the Wilder Foundation closed the home and listed the property for sale, she says.     

Brown and Zehring's redevelopment proposal includes 39 condos, each a single story, to be spread throughout multiple buildings within a three-story complex.  

The condos will closely match the neighborhood's Victorian-era homes in style and scale, with features such as gables, clapboard siding, front porches, and more, she says.    

The place will have underground parking and a courtyard, while a caretaker will be hired to help with the property's upkeep.  

Brown believes the project, for which the price tag hasn't been determined, will appeal to empty nesters who already live in the neighborhood and want to downsize, but don't want to stray too far off. "That's the population we think that will find it attractive," she says.  

Brown says the proposal will help diversify the area's housing, which is largely made up of single-family dwellings. Additionally, after over a century of being off tax rolls, "this would get it back as a tax-paying property."  

The next step is a city rezoning process to allow for the planned number of units, she explains, adding that if all goes as planned, construction will likely be underway in the fall of 2011.

 
Source: Ellen Brown, consultant and developer
Writer: Anna Pratt

Construction of the leading solar thermal energy project in the Midwest, the scale of which is comparable to two-thirds the size of a football field, recently began at the downtown Saint Paul RiverCentre.

On the convention center's 30,000-square-foot rooftop will soon be 144 commercial-grade solar thermal panels, which run 8 feet by 20 feet individually, according to project materials.   

The $2.1 million rooftop array will kick out 1 megawatt of energy and decrease carbon-dioxide emissions by 900,000 pounds yearly, materials state.    

District Energy St. Paul, which operates a biomass-fueled hot water district heating system and a combined heat and power plant and supplies the convention center's energy, will run it.

Solar thermal energy derives from heating water, explains District Energy project manager Nina Axelson. "It's a very efficient and effective way to use energy," which, she adds, outperforms solar electric power. 

Additionally, the RiverCentre's system stands out for its "fuel flexibility," Axelson says.

Extra energy will be shared with the rest of the District Energy system, which includes 80 percent of city buildings, through a grid of heating pipes. Even though similar scenarios are common in Europe, she says, "We never found any other systems like this in the U.S."

As a heating company that has a goal to eventually become 100 percent renewable, Axelson says, "It's a critical part of what we're trying to do here."

The system will be up and running sometime in January thanks to a $1 million stimulus grant from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), which District Energy matched. It's the first project that will reach completion as part of a broader DOE initiative called "Solar America Cities," which includes 26 cities--Minneapolis among them--that are tackling various solar energy technologies.    
 

Source: Nina Axelson, project manager, St. Paul District Energy  
Writer: Anna Pratt

If city officials approve it, North Minneapolis could get its first full-service bike shop by the spring of next year.

In response to a request for proposals that the city sent out some months ago, the Cultural Wellness Center submitted a proposal for Major Motion Bike Walk and Coffee, which uniquely emphasizes walking for fun, exercise or transportation, according to Kristen Klingler, who works in the city's health and family department. 

Her office recommended the proposal to a City Council committee, which will weigh in on it in January.

The South Minneapolis-based Cultural Wellness Center, a nonprofit organization that develops cultural approaches for health, economic development, and community building, plans to lease a 3,718-square-foot space at the corner of Lowry and Penn avenues north for the $450,000 project, Klingler says.

Major Motion Bike Walk and Coffee will offer new and used bikes, related gear and other accessories, plus bike repair and maintenance services and a coffee shop.

The shop will be stocked with items such as bus passes, compact shopping carts, reusable shopping bags and more, to help people make transitions from foot to bike to bus, according to Klingler.

Classes and workshops to "help people get comfortable riding the bike paths," for instance, along with spinning classes, will be held at the shop.  

The goal is to "give access to things residents need to be active on a regular basis," says Klingler, adding, "Improving health is the main focus."

The Wellness Center has enlisted the help of the Major Taylor Bicycling Club, an Upper Midwest group which tries to increase bike riding among African Americans. Other partners are the North Side's EMERGE Community Development, which provides youth employment and job training, and nearby NEON, a collaborative network that specializes in small business development support.
 
Klingler says the city has a $350,000 grant from Communities Putting Prevention to Work (CPPW) that was funneled through the Minnesota Department of Health from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, to help with the center's up-front costs.

The bike/walk center is part of a larger health initiative in the city and state that has programs geared around obesity prevention, physical activity, and healthy eating.

In North Minneapolis and beyond, strategies include expanding the Nice Ride bike-sharing program, new bike lanes and walking trails, and wayfinding signage for bike and pedestrian access--all of which will feed into the bike/walk center. "We're really excited about it," Klinger says.   

Source: Kristen Klingler, City of Minneapolis
Writer: Anna Pratt

Architects from the University of Minnesota's Metropolitan Design Center led a workshop on Nov. 20 at the school, which dovetailed with an earlier talk about creating a framework for the future of the University District.

The district includes the university campus and its surrounding neighborhoods. 

At the event, which drew nearly 100 attendees, presenters Ignacio San Martin and Marcy Schulte challenged people to think in terms of connection, stressing sustainable, walkable communities.

Organizer Ted Tucker, a 40-year resident of the Marcy-Holmes neighborhood who serves on the University District Alliance, a board that's trying to improve the area, says it builds on the "transformational visioning" process that the group initiated.

The district faces unique challenges, with several large institutions in close quarters, such as the university, Augsburg College, and nearby clinics and hospitals. "We're trying to improve connections with surrounding neighborhoods so it's mutually beneficial," says Tucker.

At this early stage, the group is just trying to keep the lines of communication open as opposed to laying out any specific plans. "We want to have neighborhood residents talking to developers," he says. "They can get accustomed to what residents might be concerned about."

Conversely, he says, "Residents can hear about how developers operate and what they're looking for."

At the recent workshop, San Martin conveyed a perspective that "goes back to geology, landforms, and how the river works with adjacent neighborhoods and the ecology of the area," Tucker explains.  

On a map San Martin pinpointed 10 contested territories that are key places "where there are lots of different forces coinciding."  

For instance, there's the question of what should happen with a right-of-way that's known as Granary Road, which once served the Burlington Northern Railroad. It starts at one end of the Stone Arch Bridge and continues through the industrial area in Southeast, near the new TCF stadium. Part of it is planned to be a two-lane road. There's been discussion about extending it. Some people believe it should be used for trucks. "There are different ideas on the best way to use the land available," Tucker says.   

The events give residents and other community stakeholders the chance to hear ideas for the area and react, Tucker says, adding that their feedback will help inform the process as it moves forward.


Source: Ted Tucker, representative of the University District Alliance
Writer: Anna Pratt

A sizable rock-climbing community in the Twin Cities is underserved, according to Nate Postma, the founder and president of the locally based company Vertical Endeavors. Numerous area rock-climbing gyms have gone out of business through the years, he explains. 

Vertical Endeavors runs several indoor rock-climbing gyms in St. Paul, Duluth, and Warrenville, Ill. In St. Paul, it offers indoor and outdoor lessons, youth programs, and group events, along with a pro shop, weight equipment, showers, lockers, and year round climate control, its website states.

As an indication of the sport's popularity, the St. Paul Vertical Endeavors location sees over 100,000 individual climbers a year. Many of them become repeat customers, Postma says.
 
For years the company scoped out various sites for a potential Minneapolis location.

Postma was pleased when Mark Krogh, the principal of Java Properties, approached Vertical Endeavors about the possibility of bringing an indoor rock-climbing gym to 26th and Nicollet Avenue in Southwest Minneapolis, as a part of a larger proposal to revamp a couple buildings on the block.

With the help of Minneapolis-based DJR Architecture, developer First & First LLC is heading the $5 million project.

The gym will go into an 11,000-square-foot space that once housed the Ice House Studio in the Whittier neighborhood.

Postma says the $2 million state-of-the-art facility will be among the largest in the country. It could be as high as 60 feet, with 25,000 square feet of climbing space. Many climbing gyms are half that size, or even smaller, he says.

It'll accommodate different styles, abilities and ages, with top-roped climbing, bouldering, and auto-belays (which allow people to go solo). "This will put Minneapolis on the map," he says, adding, "Our customers are destination-oriented."  

A branch of St. Paul's well-known burger joint, the Blue Door Pub, will be the second-largest tenant next to the gym, while the popular Azia restaurant is returning to the corner with a new concept, according to Krogh. Thirteen apartments, another restaurant, coffee shop, offices, courtyard and parking are also part of the plan.

Krogh says the rock-climbing gym will draw many new people to the restaurant-filled avenue, dubbed Eat Street. "I really believe this is going to be the next Uptown," he says. "It should be exciting. I think it's going to bring a lot of energy to Eat Street."

Source: Nate Postma, founder and president of Vertical Endeavors
Writer: Anna Pratt

They're easy to spot in their bright lime-green uniforms. "Ambassadors" are on hand to answer questions and clean up graffiti and trash, among the many other things they do in downtown Minneapolis.  

The Ambassadors collectively cover 125 blocks for the Downtown Improvement District (DID). DID is a public-private partnership that the local business community started in 2009 to keep the downtown area safe, clean, and green.

District COO Sarah Harris made the case for the DID model during a talk she gave on Nov. 5 at the Urban Land Institute.

DID, she told The Line, is one of several "business improvement districts" (BIDs) throughout the city, which help fund improvements within certain boundaries. Its mission is to "make downtown a thriving and competitive environment for recruiting and retaining businesses, employees, residents, and visitors," its website states.

Or, as Harris puts it more simply, "We are the concierge for downtown."

With over 1,000 districts nationwide to learn from, she says, "We took the best practices from several other districts and pieced them together based on what would work best in our community."    

Already, it's getting results, statistics show: Working with police, Ambassadors, who are keyed into the zone's radios and cameras, have helped dramatically decrease problems with chronic offenders. And their first-aid training has helped save lives--21 since Sept. 30 of this year, by DID's count.  

The Ambassador program is just one of many services the DID provides, including landscaping, snow removal, repair work, and more.

Thanks in part to their efforts, a recent DID survey found, downtowners' perceptions of their environment have greatly improved. "People said the area seemed friendlier, cleaner and safer," she says, adding that she gets numerous emails daily encouraging the DID to keep up the good work.

Source: Sarah Harris, COO, Downtown Improvement District
Writer: Anna Pratt

This month St. Paul held its 30th art crawl, and the semi-annual event has grown so popular that it has spawned a smaller, monthly version. Foot traffic at Saint Paul Art Crawls averages 20,000�24,000, says Robyn Priestly, executive director at the Saint Paul Art Collective, the nonprofit that runs the event.

Spectacular fall weather may have suppressed attendance at this month's three-day crawl. Priestly says reports are still being tallied from organizers at the four "clumps" of studios across the city: Lowertown and downtown; Grand Avenue; University Avenue; and the East Side.

The crawls' appeal is partly architectural, Priestly says: "Looking at the buildings is part of it because these are great old buildings, whether they're the new rehabbed buildings on University Avenue or the old warehouses down in Lowertown."

First Friday open houses occur every month in which the collective isn't mounting an art crawl. The scaled-down monthly crawls feature studios in five Lowertown buildings: Tilsner, Jax, Lowertown Lofts, Northwestern Building and the Northern Warehouse. The next First Friday, on Nov. 5, marks the one-year anniversary of the event.

One of the collective's other projects has been opening a new art gallery in the Northern Warehouse. On exhibit now (call 651-292-4373 for hours): artwork by the collective's past and present board members.

The crawls grew out of open houses held by members of the Lowertown Lofts artists' cooperative 20 years ago. For the first decade they were annual affairs before growing to a twice-yearly event that has stayed true to its original impetus. "It is a giant open house," Priestly says.

Source: Robyn Priestley, St. Paul Art Collective
Writer: Chris Steller

Being divided into 84 neighborhoods isn't always an advantage for Minneapolis. It's a daunting number of distinct districts to grapple with, for officials at City Hall as well as community organizers.

But that impressive roster may have helped Minneapolis secure host-city status for the Neighborhoods, USA Conference in 2013. The Mill City outscored four other cities vying for the national organization's annual meeting -- by a large margin, according to Neighborhoods, USA staffer Karen Huber.

A three-person Minneapolis contingent blew away the organization's board of directors with an impressive presentation at this year's conference, held recently in Alaska. Runners up included Rochester, Minn. (in second place), as well as a couple Pacific Northwest outposts: Eugene, Ore., and Tacoma, Wash.

Board members scored competing cities on criteria that included number of neighborhood organizations and their level of activity. (Most--but not all--of Minneapolis' 84 neighborhoods have resident groups.)

Racial diversity was another consideration for the Neighborhoods, USA board, half of whom are African-American. Minneapolis looked better than some places the organization has considered in the past, Harber says, recalling the response to a relatively homogeneous Utah city.

The group met in St. Paul in 1986. The economic downturn of the last few years has made centrally located cities more appealing as meeting places, she says. The cost of travel has cut attendance by the grassroots activists who make up the group's membership, says Harber, from 1,000 before the recession to a low approaching 400. For the conference in Minneapolis, Harber says the group is anticipating 500�600 attendees.

They'll fan out across the city for tours and meals in Minneapolis neighborhoods. Harber says people who come to the conference are "very relaxed" and down to earth. Some are still learning to grapple with grants and making demands on local leaders at city halls. The conference is a low-key event where they can hone those skills. "You don't have to impress the big shots," Huber says.

Source: Karen Harber, Neighborhoods USA
Writer: Chris Steller

Years of fighting ended last New Year's Eve when Exxon Mobil sent the City of St. Paul $5 million to cover pollution cleanup costs at a West Seventh neighborhood site called Victoria Park.The city bought the former oil-tank land for $1, abandoning condemnation efforts and promising to build a park instead of the vast tract of housing that Minneapolis-based Brighton Development Corporation once envisioned.

Now cleanup is underway at Victoria Park that could take as long as two more years to complete. Meanwhile, the precise sort of park the place is to become remains undecided. At issue is whether to put tournament-worthy artificial-turf athletic fields along the site's Mississippi River blufftop expanse.

"A lot of people see the bluffs as prime access to the river," says Tonya Johnson-Nicholie, who represents the West Seventh/Fort Road Federation in the Parks and Recreation Department's planning process. Public meetings still to be set this fall will let neighbors air their views. Synthetic playing fields would bring funds from the Minnesota Amateur Sports Commission--funds that the city doesn't have to develop a new park.

Patty Lilledahl, now director of business development and finance at the city's Housing and Redevelopment Authority, remembers waiting at work on New Year's Eve day for Exxon Mobil's money to arrive. Based on experts' estimates, the sum is supposed to cover pollution expenses, with some left over for the start of park-creation.

A separate, adjacent site saw the beginnings of Brighton's development get built before the recession set in. Thirteen homes, now bearing For Rent signs, stand next to the former Exxon land. The HRA still owns another seven acres of developable land that may yet become housing along the river. The Exxon and adjacent sites together encompass nearly 45 acres.

Whatever sort of park is developed, "we're thrilled because it just increases the value of the nearby properties," says Lilledahl. She adds that all along, the public purpose of the project--which began more than a decade ago with neighbors seeking a better use for the vacant land--is to increase the tax base and make the site "look a lot more attractive."

Sources: Tonya Johnson-Nicholie, West Seventh/Fort Road Federation; Patty Lilledahl, St. Paul Housing and Redevelopment Authority
Writer: Chris Steller