When the Midtown Greenway opens this fall in Minneapolis, a lot more will be riding on it than Schwinns and Treks.
Also riding on the $2.86 million public investment in the first phase of the greenway will be the hopes of public officials and neighborhood groups. They're betting that creating a recreational path across the South Side will transform stretches of aging factories and blight-ridden housing.
The project's groundbreaking today is the culmination of six years of effort to transform a garbage-strewn rut along 29th Street. The trench was dug between 1912 and 1916 to keep trains from blocking traffic.
The bike-pedestrian greenway initially will extend from near the city's western border to Honeywell Inc. at 5th Avenue S. In four years, the paths are expected to extend eastward to the Mississippi River, and connections on the west end to suburban bike trails should be made next spring.
Yet bike transportation alone isn't what attracted the greenway investment by federal, state and local governments. Rather, the project represents the first test in Minneapolis of whether adding green to the urban core can stimulate redevelopment and increase the city's tax base.
This notion is at the core of Hennepin Community Works, a multi-agency effort that is one of the greenway's backers and also is sponsoring the Humboldt Greenway renewal project in north Minneapolis.
Betting on an amenity
"If we create the environment within which good urban development can occur, it will occur," said Hennepin County Board Member Mark Andrew, who started the Community Works concept in 1993.
But Hennepin County and the city of Minneapolis aren't investing and then sitting back. Instead, they've jointly created Midtown Community Works, which brings public officials together with leaders from such companies as Allina Health System and Dayton Hudson Corp. to act as a sort of brain trust to bring clout to the redevelopment and to link the scattered revitalization projects along 29th St. and Lake St.

The group already has established redevelopment priorities to complement the first phase. The main emphasis will be on a three-block housing development on the greenway's north rim between Aldrich and Dupont Avs. S., and on planning for the possible reopening of Nicollet Avenue between 29th and Lake.
The housing project, called Urban Village, is an effort to create up to 200 units of owner-occupied housing of varying types and for people with varying incomes from what is now industrial space.
Meanwhile, the reopening of Nicollet, something of a pipe dream since it was closed to build a Kmart in the late 1970s, may have a serious chance of happening. A community task force has been formed to devise development guidelines for an intersection that has been criticized by some as sterile, the opposite of the kind of urban-village thinking now trendy in urban design. Minneapolis City Council Member Jim Niland said Kmart wants to remain on Lake, but is willing to consider a new site. That would take $4 million to $5 million. Niland said he'd like to see Nicollet reopen in three years.
Midtown Community Works also will support land-use planning for the area of E. Lake St. and Hiawatha Av. S. The aim is to tie the area's uncoordinated development together when the greenway extends to that area in about two years and when a planned light-rail transit line is built along Hiawatha.
Design challenges
The greenway itself will combine a pedestrian path with a 20-mile-per-hour bikeway.
According to Rhonda Rae, the city's project manager, design for the paths was complicated by the 21 bridges, which generally are a block apart, that line the first phase. The paths had to fit between bridge support, yet leave room for rails on which light-rail transit may run someday. Access ramps had to fit between bridges, requiring a tricky balancing of slope and space.
Although designed for high-speed commuter bikers, the route also will carry recreational traffic to the Chain of Lakes, especially from the city's interior.
"It's a pretty sorely needed recreational amenity," said Henry Hubben, president of the Midtown Greenway Coalition, the nonprofit community-based group that lobbied for the greenway.
Completion of the first phase is scheduled for Oct. 30.
Safety plan
Security was another major challenge for designers. Much of the greenway will lie 22 feet below surrounding terrain. A police crime risk assessment noted that the greenway will pass through some of the most crime-ridden parts of the metro area.
Issues range from graffiti to gangs claiming areas under bridges as their turf - with accompanying drug dealing and prostitution - to camping out by transients and occasional use of the corridor for dumping bodies.
To combat these, the deepest parts of the trail will be lit every 100 to 150 feet, and 13 camera-equipped pillars will be installed with 911 links. But the biggest determiner of public safety on the greenway will be how many users it draws, especially at night and in winter.
"I think the use of the greenway is going to be pretty much instantaneous," Hubben said.
Another determinant of safety will be the number of eyes on the greenway from above. Real estate agent Sandy Green reported a spate of sales on 29th just west of Nicollet by people anticipating the greenway. "Those have all been purchased by people who ride bicycles and are really into it," she said.
Jamie McDonald and Jennifer Van Nort last year bought a gingerbread Victorian two-bedroom house on 29th that will have the greenway as its back yard.
McDonald said they will use the greenway to commute to work and to the Uptown area.
"We wanted a park right behind us, and the greenway was going to be a park, the longest park in Minneapolis," he said. A green ribon across south Minneapolis
A groundbreaking today at 2:30 p.m. at W. 29th St. and Bryant Av. S. launches construction of the first 2.8 miles of the Midtown Greenway in south Minneapolis, featuring pedestrian and biking trails.
- Lighting, security: The deepest parts of the trail will be lit every 100 to 150 feet. Thirteen pillars will be equipped with cameras and 911 links.
- Trail: Pedestrian path and two-way bike path will be separated by a line in tight spots and will be farther apart in others. The paths combined will range from 14 to 20 feet wide.
- Bridges: In the first phase of the project, there are 21 bridges, mostly spaced a block apart.
- Rail line: The old tracks are unused; the plan leaves room for a possible light-rail line in the future.