[Mpls] Flour mills, idling trucks, Nimby and urban sprawl.
I've touched on this topic before. I think it is an often overlooked aspect of evolutionary urban life. Depending upon one's perspective, the conflict and its resolution serve as grounds for a tribute to or a diatribe against the natural forces of democracy. Flour mills are dusty, and idling trucks can be a nuisance. Eventually democratic forces will expell the nuisances from our back yards. Flour mills and idling trucks per se do not vote, their neighbors do. In the beginning, most cities are formed for their commercial attributes, not their residential amenities. Mpls was lumber mills first, followed in time by flour mills. The hydridization of the two led to a burgeoning barrel making industry, which developed into a diverse packaging industry, etc., etc. The jobs drew people. At first, the prized residential areas were those closest to the jobs. People could walk to work, eventually people rode to work via street cars. The initial industrial base began to offer opportunities for other merchants, grocers, hardwaremen, doctors, lawyers etc to meet the other needs of the workers. The proportion of workers directly tied to the industries, as opposed to all other workers living in the city declined. The wealthier, and the less connected to the job site workers did not need to be as close to the mills as others, so they migrated to the outreaches of the city, to Lowry Hill and the Whittier neighborhood on the south and west. Away from the hustle and bustle, noise and dirt. Eventually, there were a lot of people who did not need to be close. The electorate began to persuade and/or demand that the most eggregious nuisances move, so they did. I suspect rendering plants may have been among the first. Forced to the suburbs, or outer reaches. Still close enough to benefit from the population density or access to markets.And an ongoing process that continues to this day began. The economic source of the city, it's job base was slowly but inexorably exported to the fringes. First the eggregious offenders, and ultimately most non office tower jobs. Leaving behind the functionally obsolescent facilities that once served as the city's economic engine. These delapidated acres of once fertile economic sustanence are eventually rediscovered. The riverfront re-emerges this time as an amenity to attract people. Instead of factories, condo's are built. In other areas, with less amenities, instead of factories, low income housing is built. The economic engine of this city, shifts from its manufcturing and distribution base to its commercial and finance base. This is largely fitting in the evolving national economy. What's left behind however are the demographic artifacts of the past. The workers whose careers are not found in the glass towers downtown. The people for whom proximity to the job place and/or concentrated availibility to services esential to their specifc needs. There is an imbalance within the city in the make-up of the city's work force and its job base. It's easier to build housing, then a diversified economy. Re-elections are won by greasing the sqeaky wheels through effective citizen representation and the removal of blighting influences. It is a process. It operates almost as if it has a life of its own. Perhaps it does. I feel a book coming on, so I will stop here with a point or two. Cities created suburbs by banning industries. People left cities to be close to jobs in the suburbs. Suburbs flourished. Decayed portions of cities become rediscovered. New urban housing attracts empty nesters. People live in cities for their cultural and other amenities rather than their original economic base. There are hundreds of implications. Musing in Nokomis East, Earl Netwal Enjoying http://www.unitoday/etn life with healthy supplementation and a great hobby. Earl Netwal ETN Covers and Independent Usana Distributor 5344 36th Ave S http://maps.yahoo.com/py/maps.py?Pyt=Tmapaddr=5344+36th+Ave+Scsz=Minneapo lis%2C+MN+55417country=us Minneapolis, MN 55417 [EMAIL PROTECTED] www.unitoday.net/etn tel:612-724-4392 http://www.plaxo.com/signature Signature powered by Plaxo http://www.plaxo.com/signature Want a signature like this? https://www.plaxo.com/add_me?u=4295259900v0=581478k0=2037342478 Add me to your address book... REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact 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 Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:mpls@mnforum.org Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at:
Re: [Mpls] Flour mills, idling trucks, Nimby and urban sprawl.
Thanks Earl, and you make some good points about the gradual evolution of our cityscape. But our Council's draconian idling ban is not a gradual evolution to greener and better business practices. Unlike California's and every other idling restriction I could find it is immediate and sudden with no exceptions. If enacted it will change our city permanently, and not for the better. Lets look at a few of the consequences: New construction: Those new condos our Council Member Gary Schiff is so fond of are built on concrete foundations and often the entire building structures are built of concrete. Much of that concrete comes from plants here on the other side of the tracks which developers have plopped housing down right next too. Those plants and the ready mix trucks that deliver the concrete run 24 hours a day during the construction season. Concrete rapidly hardens to the consistency of rock inside the ready mix truck's barrel if you shut it off, so ready mix trucks must keep their engines running while loading at the plant and waiting to unload at the jobsite. Those plants, the hundreds of good paying union jobs they provide, and new development will leave the city if the draconian idling ban is passed. Retailing and restaurants: We have a large dairy here in the Northside and several other food producers in the city. With no way to keep food cool while loading and waiting they will probably build a new plant closer to the farms, leaving our city for good and taking hundreds of good paying union jobs with them. With night deliveries and thusly night shelf stocking essentially banned, Cub and Rainbow will make a gradual retreat from Minneapolis and the Lunds slated for Eastgate will probably be aborted. Smaller convenience stores and restaurants that do not have loading docks are commonly served by trucks with liftgates, small elevators on the rear or side of the truck to lift products from the truck down to ground level. Those liftgates are powered by the trucks engine requiring idling during deliveries. With early morning deliveries banned by the proposed idling ordinance, many convenience stores will close and many of our fine eateries will leave the city rather than be forced to serve day old milk, eggs, etc. for breakfast. Of course, the hood stores don't give a damn about the law and will probably expand into the abandoned Cubs and Rainbows... Infrastructure: When powerlines are brought down across whole neighborhoods by late afternoon storms NSP bucket trucks quickly arrive. Powered by idling truck engines the utility workers swing those buckets into action while lighting the pitch darkness, quickly shutting off arcing wires and then restoring power. But if the anti idling ordinance passes, downed power lines will have to be left to arc away all night, tying up police to secure the area of the sparking line while criminals plunder the darkened neighborhoods. And gas leaks? Unable to keep gas company trucks and their equipment running at night, whole neighborhoods and even goodly chucks of the city may have to be evacuated as gas company crews will be unable to shut off broken gas lines until the idling ban ends at 6 am! Public safety: It is telling that Council Member Schiff's idling ban provides no exemption for fire trucks... Thusly the fire trucks that power the ladders, the jaws of life, and the water spouting from the fire hoses themselves will be shut off as homes burn at 10 pm and the firestorms allowed to spread unimpeded for 8 long hours until 6 am. Fire insurance will quickly become unavailable at any price in Minneapolis as new condo projects are abandoned in mid construction to blight the cityscape for years. Council Member Schiff's vision of a green Minneapolis looks more like the gray bleakness of abandoned dairies, stores, homes... from Hawthorne, where your milk and a lot of other good stuff comes from. Dyna Sluyter I've touched on this topic before. I think it is an often overlooked aspect of evolutionary urban life. Depending upon one's perspective, the conflict and its resolution serve as grounds for a tribute to or a diatribe against the natural forces of democracy. Flour mills are dusty, and idling trucks can be a nuisance. Eventually democratic forces will expell the nuisances from our back yards. Flour mills and idling trucks per se do not vote, their neighbors do. REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact 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 Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to:
Re: [Mpls] Flour mills, idling trucks, Nimby and urban sprawl.
Hello, Sorry to take a chunk out of Earl's nice email. I wanted to help shorten things. And while I would be more than happy to take issue with some of the precise causes of white flight, that's not my reason for replying to it. I think his email serves as an excellent reminder that with the elections coming up, part of the discourse should be about where we'd like to see our city be 30 years from now. Allen Graetz Lowry Hill Earl Netwal wrote: I've touched on this topic before. I think it is an often overlooked aspect of evolutionary urban life. Depending upon one's perspective, the conflict and its resolution serve as grounds for a tribute to or a diatribe against the natural forces of democracy. Flour mills are dusty, and idling trucks can be a nuisance. Eventually democratic forces will expell the nuisances from our back yards. Flour mills and idling trucks per se do not vote, their neighbors do. ** SNIP ** I feel a book coming on, so I will stop here with a point or two. Cities created suburbs by banning industries. People left cities to be close to jobs in the suburbs. Suburbs flourished. Decayed portions of cities become rediscovered. New urban housing attracts empty nesters. People live in cities for their cultural and other amenities rather than their original economic base. There are hundreds of implications. Musing in Nokomis East, Earl Netwal REMINDERS: 1. Be civil! Please read the NEW RULES at http://www.e-democracy.org/rules. If you think a member is in violation, contact 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 Civil City-focused Civic Discussion - Mn E-Democracy Post messages to: mailto:mpls@mnforum.org Subscribe, Un-subscribe, etc. at: http://e-democracy.org/mpls
