Revitalizing the Urban Landscape
Saint Paul on the Mississippi Project Reclaims Sense of Place
Nov 27, 2008
Suburban sprawl and road networks that facilitate high-speed traffic through cities have been the ruination of many a cityscape. In cities like Saint Paul, Minnesota, citizens and planners are gradually reclaiming some of this space for people-scaled activity.
Urban transformation in Saint Paul has been impelled by several factors:
- Historically, the Mississippi River was relatively isolated from downtown Saint Paul, a legacy of a 19th century perspective that treated the river as an industrial and transportation corridor. New thinking recognizes the river’s recreational resources and its ability to create connections to Saint Paul’s urban core.
- Saint Paul has reserves of obsolescent land, brownfield sites that formerly housed industrial or commercial activity. Many of these urban sites had been abandoned for suburban locations or businesses disappeared completely, sometimes leaving hazardous material behind.
- The downtown of Saint Paul contains pockets of rundown buildings, and in some adjacent neighbourhoods, the building stock has deteriorated. These areas are characterized by degradation of parks and sidewalks in the public realm.
As cities recognize that continued suburban sprawl is not desirable, inner city neighbourhoods are obvious targets for redevelopment.
Saint Paul on the Mississippi Development Framework
Ken Greenberg of Greenberg Consultants is the master planner responsible for the Saint Paul on the Mississippi Development Framework. The framework sets out ten design principles for guiding strategic investments in the city. Greenberg is a proponent of planning that emphasizes strategic visioning and the construction of winning collaborations between citizens, civic administrations and private sector partners like developers.
The planning process in Saint Paul started with a series of community consultations to establish design principles and planning priorities. Out of these conversations and design charrettes emerged 10 design principles, including the following:
- To compensate for the damage wreaked by urbanization, restoring the city’s unique urban ecology became a primary objective.
- Investments in the public realm were proposed to create pleasant pedestrian experiences on city sidewalks and in parks.
- A broader mix of building uses was recommended to encourage activity on streetscapes for longer periods of the day.
- The creation of a more balanced network of movement through the city is intended to make public transit more attractive, and to provide for alternate modes of transit: walking and cycling, in addition to public transit and the automobile.
A vision for a great river park developed out of these planning exercises. This big idea was realized by creating connections into the neighbouring districts, river paths for pedestrians and cyclists, and a clean up of the river; tree planting reclaimed the river bank.
Between 1994 and 2003, 30 acres of new park land was developed, 2.7 miles of new riverfront trails constructed, and $1.8 billion in new investments in infrastructure made. Jobs were created for people who were underemployed, and citizens have developed a new appreciation of the city’s natural heritage.
Cities Are Never Finished
In 2005, more than a decade after planning first began for the city-in-a-park vision, Saint Paul decided to raise the bar on future development. Planning is underway to build a light rail transit network from Minneapolis to Saint Paul. Simultaneously, sustainability measures are being introduced to ensure that future development meets a higher level of accountability.
The framework document continues to serve as a guide for the strategic investment of public resources. It also serves as a catalyst for private investment and clarifies the ground rules for developers. Saint Paul has successfully redefined its relationship with the river and demonstrated that where public will, civic determination and private money come together, urban renewal is possible.
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