Bill Dooley writes: "Too many lofts jammed together and Minnepolis will begin to look the the concrete jungles of New York and Chicago. I prefer the lofts scattered throughout the various neighborhoods such as the ones on 26 and Nicollet and 38th St. and 23rd Av."
------- As a former NYC resident with more than a passing familiarity of Chicago, I'd like to put a finer point on what Bill Dooley writes above. Downtown Minneapolis and the Warehouse District consistently strike me as more of a "concrete jungle" than comparable neighborhoods in NYC or Chi. The main reason is lack of greenery and the virtual absence of setbacks from the sidewalk or other architectural relief that let the streetscape "breathe." These qualities are found aplenty in New York and Chicago, even in the old warehouse neighborhoods where the first, "true" residential loft retrofits began. In the mid-1990's I built out a third-floor walkup loft that once used to be a hay loft in a suffocating brick building a stone's throw from the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway (elevated to three stories) in the Gowanus section of Brooklyn, an area of that town that has, in later years, begun to be thought of as "cool." We occupied the shell. The place didn't have so much as a working toilet. The location was loud, sooty, alternatingly freezing or roasting depending on the season, but it was great for us because it was big (1,500 square feet, a virtual rancho grande in NYC terms) and cheap and let us have a woodshop/living room among other build-to-suit peculiarities. We were willing to do without a lot of comforts just to get a large raw space. But doing without an array of comforts inside and outside the building is not in the program for the lofty people in the present market. Perhaps Mr. Dooley favors the 26th/Nicollet and 38th/23rd loft locations because they are in locations with NEIGHBORHOOD SERVICES. My old Brooklyn loft had none around (unless you think prostitution is a neigbhorhood service). Only when some decent food stores, hardwares, laundries and other businesses started to trickle in did that neighborhood start turning over its rough loft spaces to cater to an upscale market. The Warehouse District lofts, like the International Market Square lofts and those being put up like crazy along Washington Ave, suffer most, in my opinion, for lack of services. They're urban in character, but hardly so in nature, as they're very isolated from the goods and services you need to carry on daily life. If these services don't come in soon, people may start to question why they're paying so much money to lease or own such "urban" digs. And a tree or two would be nice, even an overgrown lot. Not to mention the general funk and flavor of street life. Right now the paint is not yet dry on designer loft scene in Minneapolis. With their neat lines and uncluttered streetscapes, the loft spaces/buildings now being developed still seem more like the architect's rendering than a real place to live. I certainly join with many others in hoping that a rounder pattern of develelopment emerges in these locations. But, hey, I just moved to Golden Valley, so what do I know about it? Evan Reminick REMINDERS: 1. Think a member has violated the rules? Email the list manager at [EMAIL PROTECTED] before continuing it on the list. 2. Don't feed the troll! Ignore obvious flame-bait. For state and national discussions see: http://e-democracy.org/discuss.html For external forums, see: http://e-democracy.org/mninteract ________________________________ Minneapolis Issues Forum - A City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
