Streets.mn
50 episodes - English - Latest episode: over 4 years ago - ★★★★ - 15 ratingsTransportation and Land Use in Minnesota
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Episodes
Podcast #127: Saint Paul’s 6th Ward with Nelsie Yang
October 30, 2019 02:04I am happy to bring you a conversation with Nelsie Yang, who is a candidate for City Council in Saint Paul’s Sixth Ward, which covers the large northern part of the East Side. Yang is a community organizer who is advocating for economic sustainability, affordable housing, and better public safety on the East Side. We […]
Podcast #126: Saint Paul Climate Action with Chelsea DeArmond
October 02, 2019 17:57I’m happy to bring you a conversation with Chelsea DeArmond, one of the founders of Saint Paul’s 350.org chapter. 350 dot org is an international climate action group that is trying very hard to place climate change at the center of our cultural conversations, and catalyze change in how we use energy in the US. […]
Podcast #125 – Stopping the Federal Reserve Parking Ramp with Nancy Gardner and Tom Mallon
August 20, 2019 17:00I’m excited to bring you today a conversation with Nancy Gardner and Tom Mallon, who residents of downtown Minneapolis that organized an effort to successfully stop a large parking ramp from being constructed in their neighborhood. Nancy and Tom live near the Mississippi River on the northern part of downtown Minneapolis, located very close to […]
Podcast #124 – Saint Paul’s Ward One with Liz De La Torre
June 20, 2019 18:14Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Liz De La Torre, who is running for City Council in Saint Paul’s Ward 1. I sat down with Liz a while back at the Heritage Tea House on University Avenue to talk about her campaign, her background working as a advocate for victims of domestic violence, and […]
Podcast #123: Saint Paul’s Ward 6 with Terri Thao
March 07, 2019 20:58This podcast is an interview with Terri Thao, who is running for City Council in Saint Paul’s 6th Ward, on the East Side of the city. Terri Thao is a long-time non-profit professional, former Planning Commissioner, and community organizer, among other things, who has spent years working on issues around housing, transit, and economic development […]
Podcast #122: Planning for Walking in Saint Paul with Fay Simer
December 19, 2018 21:44Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Fay Simer. Fay Simer is the Pedestrian Coordinator for Saint Paul Public Works Department, and she has been working diligently on the city’s first ever official pedestrian plan. Like most cities, Saint Paul has never had an official plan for how to design a city for people to […]
Podcast #121: Activating Nicollet Avenue with Lisa Middag
December 04, 2018 18:34Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Lisa Middag, the director of Nicollet Activation for the Minneapolis Downtown Improvement District. What does Nicollet activation” mean? I’m glad you asked. You’ll find out all about it in just a second, but it’s the person who is charged with bringing street life and economic activity to Nicollet […]
Podcast #120: Minneapolis 2040 with Heather Worthington and Paul Mogush
October 17, 2018 18:13Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Heather Worthington and Paul Mogush, two of the people behind the forthcoming Minneapolis 2040 Comprehensive Plan. The Minneapolis 2040 Comprehensive Plan is the basic planning document for the city, a ten-year update required by the regional government, and Minneapolis’ plan has been getting a lot of attention for […]
Podcast #119: Preserving Urban Alleys with Christian Huelsman
September 06, 2018 14:30Today I’m bringing you a conversation with Christian Huelsman, a public space preservationist who has, for years, been an advocate for alleys, public spaces, and urban history in Cincinnati Ohio and Minneapolis, Minnesota. Alleys are not always places that get a lot of love in the United States, especially in cities that have a legacy […]
Podcast #118: Driver Behavior at Saint Paul Crosswalks with Nichole Morris
August 15, 2018 15:00Today I’m bringing you our 118th episode, a conversation with Dr. Nichole Morris. Dr. Morris is the director of the HumanFIRST Laboratory at the University of Minnesota, and is a researcher and scholar who focuses on the intersection of transportation, technology, and behavior. We sat down a few months ago in her office at the […]
Podcast #117: Saint Paul’s Ward 4 with Mitra Jalali Nelson
July 31, 2018 20:22Welcome to the streets.mn podcast. Today I’m bringing you episode 117: Saint Paul’s Ward 4 with Mitra Jalali Nelson. This is another in my interviews with political candidates for local public office. Longtime listeners of this podcast will remember, for example, five years ago when I interviewed people running in Minneapolis and Saint Paul for […]
Podcast #116: Saint Paul 1978 with George Latimer, David Lanagren, and Jerry Mathiason
July 20, 2018 19:19Welcome to the streets.mn podcast, Episode 116: Saint Paul 1978 with George Latimer, Jerry Mathiason, and David Lanagren. Today I have a fun conversation for you that I taped back in May. The chat took place between former Saint Paul mayor George Latimer, photographer Jerry Mathiason, and Macalester Geography professor David Lanagren that took place […]
Podcast #115 – Ramsey County’s 3rd District with Trista Matas-Castillo
July 06, 2018 20:43This week’s episode features Trista Matas-Castillo, who is running for Ramsey County Commissioner in the 3rd District, which covers a big chunk of the northern neighborhoods of Saint Paul. Most people in Ramsey County cannot even name a County Commissioner, and yet county governments do a ton of work to help people and govern transportation decisions […]
Podcast #114: Painting Suburbia with Carolyn Swiszcz
June 26, 2018 15:21Carolyn Swiszcz is one of my favorite local artists, a painter, printmaker, and visual artist who works a lot in some of my favorite slash least favorite landscapes: post-war suburbia. I first came across Carolyn a short musical video she made about West Saint Paul Minnesota, a first-ring suburb near where I grew up. As […]
Podcast #113: Extreme Victorian Restoration with Matt Mazanec
June 12, 2018 18:22I’m really excited to share this podcast with you, because it’s a new topic for me — an in depth look at restoration of a unique old house on the East Side of Saint Paul – and I personally loved talking to Matt about his incredible passion for his house. I first came across Matt […]
Podcast #112: Mapping the History of Racial Covenants in Minneapolis
May 14, 2018 18:38I’m back with another streets.mn podcast and it’s a good one. I sat down a few weeks ago with the team from Mapping Prejudice, a groundbreaking historical research effort to shed light on the racist history of housing practices in Minneapolis. Joining me around the table in the basement of the Borchert Map Library were […]
Podcast #111: A Vision for Duluth’s Superior Street with Ben Garland
April 11, 2018 17:00The podcast this week is a conversation with Ben Garland, a Duluth resident who runs a small business in the hillside neighborhood. Over the last year or so, Garland has been organizing to try and change the design for a street reconstruction project on Superior Street in downtown Duluth. Superior Street is Duluth’s main street, […]
Podcast #110: Cars and Phones and State Transportation Policy with Frank Hornstein
March 20, 2018 17:16The podcast this week is a conversation with State Representative Frank Hornstein, who represents district 61A in south Minneapolis. Frank Hornstein has long been a leader in the Minnesota House on transportation issues, and is currently the ranking minority member of a whole bunch of transportation-related committees. The state legislative session is going on right […]
Podcast #109: Walking Every Street in Minneapolis with Max Hailperin
February 28, 2018 14:00The podcast this week is a conversation with Max Hailperin. Max Hailperin is fascinating Minneapolis flaneur who has been quietly walking down every street in Minneapolis over the last few years. To do it, Hailperin maps neighborhoods, figures out the most mathematically efficient route through the neighborhoods, walks every street, and then writes about it […]
Podcast #108: The 2017 Minneapolis Mayoral Forum on Sustainable and Equitable Transportation
November 04, 2017 14:56The podcast this week is a special one. Just like we did four years ago, streets.mn co-hosted a forum with candidates running to be the mayor of Minneapolis. This is a recording that hour-and a half long conversation, which was moderated by Freddy Bell and featured four candidates for mayor: Raymond Dehn, Jacob Frey, Tom […]
Podcast #107: Minneapolis Elections Explainer with David Brauer
October 31, 2017 21:07The podcast this week is a conversation with David Brauer, a long-time local Minneapolis journalist, all about the upcoming Minneapolis city elections where 13 city council seats and the next mayor will be decided. We sat down at Butter Bakery Café in Brauer’s beloved Kingfield neighborhood the other day to discuss the election, both the […]
Podcast #106: Minneapolis Ward 3 with Ginger Jentzen
October 20, 2017 22:47The podcast this week is a conversation with Ginger Jentzen, who is running for Minneapolis City Council in Ward 3. Jentzen is a community organizer who formerly ran the successful 15 now living wage campaign that raised the minimum wage in Minneapolis this year. Now she’s running for Council as part of the Socialist Alternative […]
Podcast #105: Bikes and Churches with Travis Norvell, the Pedaling Pastor
September 22, 2017 22:11The podcast this week is a conversation with Travis Norvell, aka the Pedaling Pastor. Norvell is a pastor at the Judson Memorial Baptist Church in South Minneapolis, and is also an avid bicyclists who blogs and tweets using his handle, the Pedaling Pastor. We sat down a few weeks ago at the Bad Weather Brewery […]
Podcast #105: Sustain Ward 3 with Amanda Willis and Brandon Long
August 28, 2017 18:36This week’s podcast is a conversation with Amanda Willis and Brandon Long, two of the people who have organized called Sustain Ward 3, a new community group in Saint Paul focusing on urban issues. We sat down in Long’s living room the other day to chat about the history of the grassroots organization, Sustain Ward […]
Podcast #104: Redesigning Maryland Avenue with Jim McDonough
August 16, 2017 18:53The podcast this week is a conversation with Jim McDonough, who is a County Commissioner on the Ramsey County board representing the East Side of Saint Paul. Commissioner McDonough and I sat down in his office a few weeks ago to talk about the recent “public works test” along Maryland Avenue on Saint Paul’s East […]
Podcast #103: Minneapolis Ward 7 with Janne Flisrand
August 04, 2017 20:19The podcast this week is a conversation with Janne Flisrand. In addition to being a housing policy consultant and the vice-chair of streets.mn, Janne Flisrand is running for City Council in Minneapolis’ Ward 7, a neighborhood around uptown, Lake of the Isles, downtown, Loring Park, and Bryn Mawr. We sat down the other day to […]
Podcast #102: A Pedestrian Future for Downtown Minneapolis with Leif Pettersen
July 11, 2017 20:33The podcast this week is a conversation with Leif Pettersen, a travel writer and tourist public relations professional who lives in downtown Minneapolis. We sat down a few weeks ago in the Minneapolis skyway system to chat about a recent op-ed he wrote in the Star Tribune, calling for the creation of pedestrian-only streets downtown. We […]
Podcast #101: Minneapolis’ Ward 11 with Erica Mauter
April 28, 2017 19:45The podcast this week is a conversation with Erica Mauter, a engineer and executive director of the Twin Cities Women’s Choir, a non-profit. Mauter is running for City Council in Minneapolis’ Ward 11, in the Southern part of the city. We sat down for a chat the other day at Berry Sweet Kitchen on 34th Avenue, and […]
Podcast #100 – Skyways and Streetlife with Eric Dayton
April 20, 2017 21:40The podcast this week is a conversation with Eric Dayton, the founder and chief booster of the Minneapolis Skyway Avoidance Society. Eric Dayton is the owner of two downtown Minneapolis businesses – the Bachelor Farmer restaurant and Askov-Finlayson, a clothing retailer – and, of course, son of Minnesota governor Marc Dayton. We sat down a […]
Podcast #99: Minneapolis Ward 1 with City Council Candidate Jillia Pessenda
April 02, 2017 22:43The podcast this week is a conversation with Jillia Pessenda, a community organizer who is running for city council representing Minneapolis’ Ward 1 in the northeast corner of the city. We sat down a few weeks ago at Maya Cuisine on Central Avenue to chat about her background and her campaign, affordable housing in Minneapolis, […]
Podcast #98: Minneapolis Ward 11 with City Council Candidate Jeremy Schroeder
April 02, 2017 22:11The podcast this week is a conversation with Jeremy Schroeder, a director of a non-profit focused on affordable housing. Schroeder is running for City Council in Ward 11, on the city border in South Minneapolis. We sat down a few months ago at the Wild Mind Ales brewery to talk about his background, the Twin […]
Top 7 Urban Planning Podcasts (Other than Streets.mn)
March 08, 2017 16:30You may not have noticed, but podcasting (online prerecorded radio) is in the middle of a golden age. There are literally thousands of them right now, pumping out regular shows on every topic you can imagine, from old-timey styled radio shows, to in-depth analysis on everything that has, is, or can happen on this planet, […]
Podcast #97: Cities, Welfare, and Block Grants with Dana DeMaster
February 21, 2017 19:20The podcast this week is a conversation with Dana DeMaster, a program evaluator who focuses on poverty and public health programs at the State and County level. Dana is also on the streets.mn board, and a long-time advocate for better bicycling in Minnesota. We sat down a while ago to discuss how cities and counties deliver […]
Podcast #96: The Urban Effects of Amazon.com with Spencer Cox
January 06, 2017 21:36The podcast this week is a conversation with Spencer Cox, a Geography PhD student at the University of Minnesota who is studying how amazon.com is changing the urban landscape in America. Cox has spent the last few years researching amazon, both its logistics and employment practices on the exurban fringe and the way that Amazon […]
Podcast #95: Energy and Carbon Consensus with Brendan Jordan
December 20, 2016 19:56This week’s podcast is a conversation with Brendan Jordan, the vice-president of the Great Plains Institute, a Minneapolis-based energy and climate think tank. I sat down with Brendan last week at his office to discuss the political landscape of climate change policy, both locally and nationally. We discussed how to think about climate and energy […]
Podcast #94: The Future of Renewable Energy Policy with J. Drake Hamilton
December 06, 2016 21:07This week’s podcast is a conversation with J. Drake Hamilton, a Science Policy Director for Fresh Energy, a Minnesota-based non-profit that works at the intersection of energy and environmental policy. J. and I sat down to talk about what the climate change conversation might look like over the next few years, in a political landscape […]
Podcast #93: Visiting Minneapolis’ Lost Skid Row with James Eli Shiffer
November 30, 2016 15:26Hello! This week’s podcast is a conversation with James Eli Shiffer, a writer and editor at the Star Tribune, about his recent book the King of Skid Row: John Bacich and the Twilight Years of Old Minneapolis. The book is an in-depth account of Shiffer’s research into the old Gateway area of downtown Minneapolis, centered […]
Podcast #92 – Beyond Richfield with County Commission Candidate Debbie Goettel
November 04, 2016 18:07This week’s podcast is a conversation with Debbie Goettel, the mayor of Richfield and a candidate for the Hennepin County Commissioner in the 5th District, which encompasses Richfield, Bloomington, and a big chuck of Eden Prairie. We sat down at the Southdale Library this week, right on the Edina border, to talk about the role […]
Podcast #91 – Talking about Newport with Mayoral Candidate Dan Lund
November 01, 2016 18:15This week’s podcast is a conversation with Dan Lund, a patent lawyer and City Council member in Newport, Minnesota (population 3,500). Lund is one of the two candidates running for Mayor in the small Washington County suburb, located Just south of the Saint Paul border on the Mississippi River. We chatted about Newport, zoning, and […]
Podcast #90 – Talking West Saint Paul with City Council Candidate John Justen
October 07, 2016 19:22Here’s new podcast for you discussing the opposite side of the Metro area from the previous episode. This week’s podcast is a conversation with John Justen, a father, small business owner, and resident of West Saint Paul who is running for city council in that suburban city of 20,000 on the north edge of Dakota County. John and I sat down at […]
Podcast #89: Talking Columbia Heights with City Council Candidate Sean Broom
September 16, 2016 17:35Hello! I’m rebooting the podcast after a long hiatus. My equipment was stolen along with my bike pannier a while ago, but thanks to the help of some supporters, I was able to replace and upgrade it with some new and better microphones. So thanks to everyone who pitched in! I really appreciate it. With […]
Podcast #88: James Warden on the Future of Hopkins
September 11, 2015 22:50The podcast this week is a conversation with James Warden, who as well as writing many fine columns for this site, is running for City Council in Hopkins Minnesota. Warden is a former journalist and media analyst, a zoning and planning commissioner, and a big fan of good urban design. We sat down at the […]
Podcast #87: Linda Feltes on Workplace Wellness
September 06, 2015 17:46Here’s a podcast conversation with Linda Feltes, the workplace wellness coordinator for the state of Minnesota Office of Management and Budget. I first met Linda when we both testified in favor of the Saint Paul Bicycle Plan earlier this year, and so we met up later at Claddagh Coffee on West 7th Street. We sat down […]
Podcast #86: Planning Campus Bicycling with Steve Sanders and Tyler Schow
July 31, 2015 21:23And the podcast is back after a long hiatus. Today I have a special conversation with University of Minnesota student (and streets.mn contributor) Tyler Schow and Steve Sanders, the alternative transportation manager for the University of Minnesota. Tyler, Steve, and I chatted about how much the University of Minnesota campus has changed for bikes in the last […]
Podcast #85: Over North with Jeff Skrenes, Brian Finstad, and Will Lumpkins
March 23, 2015 14:11The podcast this week is a conversation with Jeff Skrenes, Brian Finstad, and Will Lumpkins, all about the historic preservation, transportation and neighborhood revitalization in North Minneapolis. Jeff, Brian, and Will are all very active in the community organizing and local politics in North Minneapolis, as well as posting and writing on the internet. We […]
Podcast #84 – All About Arts Districts with Brenda Kayzar
March 02, 2015 03:16The podcast this week is a conversation with Brenda Kayzar, a professor of Geography at the University of Minnesota who researches urban real estate, housing, and the role of artists in urban economies. We sat down the other day to talk about the history and future of “arts districts” in the US, particularly the northeast Minneapolis […]
Podcast #83 – Minneapolis’s Milwaukee Avenue with Bob Roscoe
February 13, 2015 22:18The podcast this week is a conversation with Bob Roscoe, a Minneapolis architect, activist and author who wrote the book Milwaukee Avenue: Community Renewal in Minneapolis. If you didn’t know about it already, Milwaukee Avenue is one of the most unique streets in Minneapolis, a three-block long stretch of historic working class homes in the […]
Podcast #82 – The Minnesota Transportation Picture with Scott Dibble
February 09, 2015 20:38The podcast this week is a conversation with Scott Dibble, who represents Minnesota Senate District 61 covering southwest Minneapolis. For the last ten years, Senator Dibble has been a leading voice in Minnesota conversations around two key issues; the first is the equal rights movement round sexual orientation, where Dibble sponsored the gay marriage legislation […]
Podcast #81: Inside Ending Homelessness with Randall Cohn
January 30, 2015 20:08The podcast this week is a conversation with Randall Cohn, a law student and long-time worker and wonk working on homelessness policy in Minneapolis. We sat down the other day in the back room of Club Jaeger, right in the North Loop near many of the homeless shelters of downtown Minneapolis. We chatted all bout […]
Podcast #80: Amusingly Approaching Public Policy with Tane Danger
January 21, 2015 17:11The podcast this week is a conversation with Tane Danger, the co-founder of the Theater of Public Policy, which is a highly unique combination of public policy conversations and improve comedy. The Theater of Public Policy, or T2P2 as it’s known, has been around for a few years in the Twin Cities, bringing notable political, institutional, […]