Wrecking MSP

In which we document the lost and threatened buildings, neighborhoods and communities of Minneapolis and St Paul

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2821 Girard Avenue South, Minneapolis 55408. KLP “Turkey Guys’“ fifth house demolition in the Wedge. This cute bungalow and the two houses to its north were wrecked  for an apartment building.

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Headed for the landfill: 2008 BRYANT AVE S  MINNEAPOLIS 55405

KLP “Renovate to Wreck” Turkey Guys’ 6th house demo in Wedge.…Purchase was complete before listing went public. All interior photos and front view pic were taken off the internet immediately thereafter.. Date Application Submitted February 16, 2016 Permit Type Description MASTER LAND USE APPLICATION Application Description Site plan review for new apartment building with 10 dwelling units. Permit # BZZ 7594 Property ID: 33-029-24-11-0070 Ward 10 (Lisa Bender’s ward and neighborhood) Applicant Name DDMZ REAL ESTATE (and owner) 3033 EXCELSIOR BLVD #100 MINNEAPOLIS MN 55416 Assigned Planner Email Contact [email protected] 

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Transitions: Lost—Minneapolis Star-Tribune Building | National Trust for Historic Preservation

The Minneapolis Star-Tribune building was demolished in early 2015. (Parts of it live on, though.)

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St. Paul to tear down century-old house, against panel's advice

The city-owned "Schornstein House," at 716 Wilson Ave. in the Dayton's Bluff district, will be demolished over the objection of St. Paul's Heritage Preser

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A 123-year-old building on Washington Avenue will likely be demolished to expand Bobby and Steve's Auto World, after receiving sign off from a city panel.

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Developer razes one of longest-vacant Mpls homes

A large backhoe began ripping apart a developer-owned duplex a block off of Lake of the Isles on Wednesday, erasing one of the longest-vacant homes...

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Wrecking MSP turned 1 today! The wrecking continues. Here’s hoping for a slowdown soon. . . .

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1123 East Superior Street - Zenith City Online:

Architect John J. Wangenstein designed the home shown in the top photo, the 1900 Louis and Celia Loeb House at 1123 East Superior Street. In 1921 the Loebs moved to Lester Park. After the Loebs moved the house became the residence of Duluth’s Roman Catholic bishop until 1941. It served as a boarding house until the 1980s when it became Silver’s Dress Shop. Silver’s closed in 2001 and the house was demolished in 2011 to [...]

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MPR News audio: "As so-called "tear downs" have become prevalent in the core cities, they've brought with them some controversy. Homeowners in the Crocus Hill and Tangletown neighborhoods of St. Paul have run into opposition after plans to tear down older properties."

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Aldermanic privilege and the wrecking of the Orth House, 2320 Colfax Ave. S.

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"Large or small, dozens of ideas for improving three Minneapolis regional parks that draw several million visitors annually are being floated in draft plans that will govern how those parks are retooled over the coming decades. The proposals are the first large-scale rethinking of these city parks in decades and will reflect generational changes in attitudes and interests in outdoor recreation." Excellent!

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Tevlin: Does Bloomington attorney work for the city or the Mall of America?

When hundreds of protesters descended on the Mall of America on Dec

You can wreck the cities in ways other than physical:

"The notion that people expressing themselves in public should pay for the police is perhaps unprecedented, according to civil rights attorneys, and certainly chilling to anyone who thinks they might want to gather to protest something, someday.

How many people would attend a demonstration, whether it was an antiwar rally or a pro-gun gathering, if you had to pay for police you didn’t ask for? Peaceful assembly is a founding right, not “The Price Is Right.”

Chuck Samuelson, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Minnesota, said Bloomington is attempting something seldom seen anywhere else. He recalls only one other instance in which a city tried to charge demonstrators for police presence, but it was immediately dropped.

“I think what the city attorney is trying to do is blatantly un-American,” said Samuelson. “Going after them for police costs is beneath the dignity of the office she holds.”"

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"In the last three decades, however, the bourgeoisie has returned to claim the city as its home. Driven in part by their embrace of high-density, environmentally friendly living, and in part by speculative investments of public and private capital in high-end restaurants, luxury housing, entertainment centers, and other amenities, the elite are transforming cities at a shocking rate. Meanwhile, working-class residents are being displaced to suburbs, where job opportunities are more scarce, public services and benefits are harder to access, and people are spread farther apart."

I think this is very clearly happening in the Twin Cities, with the growing glut of luxury housing replacing more affordable living options. 

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Will Downtown East’s Momentum Boost Concert Venue Plans?

  "The Minneapolis Armory, where the Minneapolis Lakers played games in the 1950s, has been a real estate riddle for nearly 30 years in downtown Minneapolis. The Minnesota National Guard moved out in 1986; Hennepin County paid $4.7 million for the fortress-like structure in 1990, intending to raze it for a new jail. But that bid was blocked in 1993 by the Minnesota Supreme Court, and now the building is the city’s most historic car park.

The Depression-era relic takes up a full city block between 5th and 6th Streets. The building, which dates to 1935, is the only downtown parking garage that’s also listed on the National Register of Historic Places."

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An op-ed from Portland about the environmental impact of all the recent teardowns. 

By Midge Pierce   

The greenest house is an existing house.

Lost in the din over demolition is the environmental cost of razing homes. Carbon is stored in the timber and materials of older homes, but it is expended in the harvesting of fresh resources, the manufacturing and delivery of new materials plus the transport of manpower to and from a new building worksite.

The Markham House 3206 NE Glisan

3206 NE Glisan

“It can take over 50 years to offset the materials wasted in demolition,” says Val Ballestrem, education manager at Bosco-Milligan Architectural Heritage Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to raising awareness of the value of older homes. “The notion of building a new, energy efficient house is ludicrous.”

In a city that prides itself on sustainable practices, he says the rise of home demolitions to pre-recession levels is a terrible waste of precious resources. “New buildings start at a point of negative energy. Saving old homes is the most sustainable practice.”

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"Attorney Erik Hansen reports that this afternoon Judge Frank J. Magill, Jr. denied the Healy Project’s request for an injunction against the demolition of 2320 Colfax Avenue South, a.k.a. the Orth House.The judge will issue the rationale for the decision at a later date.

This decision comes as no surprise, as the house is already torn apart in preparation for the Lander Group’s backhoes.  However, the Healy Project fully intends to take its case to the Court of Public Opinion, where voters, taxpayers, and concerned citizens can decide whether the political process that took down the historic house at 2320 Colfax was fair, unbiased and uncorrupted."