Minneapolis Public Works Department: Blame the pedestrian and promote cars

Last week there was a small neighborhood meeting with staff from Minneapolis Public Works about pedestrian safety at one location in Seward Neighborhood in Minneapolis.

It seems that the Public Works department has the same analysis of any pedestrian safety situation:

1. We can't make cars wait too long at an intersection.
2. We don't mark crosswalks unless it is at an intersection where the cars are already forced to stop by a traffic light or stop sign because:

• Drivers ignore the crosswalks.
• Drivers ignore the state law that requires them to stop for pedestrians at marked (or unmarked) crosswalks.
• We don't want to give pedestrians a false sense of security.

In short, it seems they are saying that they don't care that the drivers are the ones causing the unsafe conditions and that pedestrians should only cross at traffic lights or stop signs (no matter how far out of the way they are.

Greenhouse gas reduction grant application causing more greenhouse gasses.

I just submitted a proposal in response to the Minneapolis Request-for-proposals for ideas to reduce greenhouse gases on the neighborhood level.

The proposal did not allow electronic submission and required:

Six copies of:

• A cover Page
• A six page application form (the maximum but I challenge anyone to answer all their questions in less than 6 pages)
• Attachments (in our case, 4 letters of support from partners)

Plus, one copy each of:

• An organization chart (1 page)
• List of board members (1 page)
• Audit (11 pages)
• Annual report (we didn't have one but assume a minimum of 4 pages)

A total of 83 sheets of paper. I had to drive downtown to drop off by 4 PM (I don't know anyone who submits grant applications early-- and saw three other neighborhood groups dropping off grant applications).

Think of all the paper, all the electricity for copiers and all the gas for driving downtown that could have been saved if we all could have submitted the greenhouse gas reduction applications via email.

BTW, this was for a maximum of $10,000 for a six month program. I've submitted shorter applications for multi-year grants of over $100,000. I'm not going to start on how much time the City is forcing it's neighborhood groups to waste on applications like this.

Check out Franklin Planning Blog

I've been spending my blogging time (the little that there seems to be) on the Franklin Avenue Planning blog at http://www.FranklinAvenue.org.

The Franklin Avenue Planning Project (funded in part by Minneapolis' "Great Streets" initiative) is a joint project of the neighborhood group I chair (Seward Neighborhood Group), the local Community Development Corporation (Seward Redesign) and the local business association (Seward Civic and Commerce Association). It is for the part of Franklin Avenue between The Mississippi and the Hiawatha Line Light Rail station.