Life Out Of Balance

A hierarchical classification of roadways. Classification involves determining what function each roadway should perform before determining street widths, speed limits and other design features as well as operational characteristics of a street.

Principal Arterial: The metropolitan highway system is made up of the principal arterials in the region. Principal arterials include all interstate freeways. These roads only connect with other freeways, principal arterials and minor arterials and collectors. The emphasis is on mobility, not access.

Minor Arterial: Minor arterial streets connect major generators within central business districts and regional business concentrations. The emphasis of minor arterials is on mobility as opposed to access in the urban area. The minor arterial should connect to principal arterials, other minor arterials and collectors. Connection to some local streets is acceptable. Minor arterials should service medium to short trips.

Collector: The collector system provides connections between neighborhoods, and from neighborhoods to minor business concentrations. Mobility and land access are equally important. Direct land access should be predominantly to development connections. Typically, collectors serve short trips of one to four miles.

Local Streets: Local streets connect blocks and land parcels. The primary emphasis is on land access. In most cases, local streets will connect to other local streets and collectors; occasionally, they will connect to minor arterials. Local streets serve short trips at low speeds.

This is pulled directly from the City of Minneapolis website. I think this shows exactly why we have a serious problem with our roadway. Cedar is a type 'A' minor arterial and we are allowing it to be misused. We are not using it for local trips (patronizing local business etc) it's being used by commuters for long trips from the burbs. many people who would use it regularly for short trips are pushed to the other, smaller streets, and misusing them (unfortunately). This is pushing everything in our ENTIRE AREA out of wack. So issues on nearby, once quiet, residential roads are likely related to Cedar. Getting this monster road back on track is a big deal. It will restore the balance and encourage using Cedar as it was intended. By encouraging local traffic and shorter trips we can do a number of things:
-save on gas
-emphasize transit
-ENCOURAGE LOCAL BUSINESS
-reduce through traffic and related issues (crime both vehicular and otherwise, litter... decreasing traffic slightly should make it far easier to enforce don't you think?)
-increase the lifespan of the roadbed
-preserve and encourage use of beautiful local park areas (Powederhorn, Corcoran, Sibley, McRae and Nokomis
-Reduce toxic roadway runoff into Lake Nokomis, Minnehaha Creek and by extension, the MS River
I have to emphasize again what an important road Cedar is, and has always been. But in this case we are suffering from the effects of 50 years worth of poorly planned development. Too many people useing a local road when they should use the freeway (this happened WAY before the crosstown project began) and let's not kid ourselves, they aren't headed to Cedar Small Engine, Candy Jar or any of the other fantastic businesses along Cedar, they're headed to work or home. The chance of them stopping, and adding time to thier alreay long commute, is unlikey. So, now we have a chance to fix it. How does it go: "We can rebuild him - We have the technology..." well it's true, we do. But apathy won't do it, even a little bit of effort can do a lot. (that was my pitch)

There will be a short meeting this coming Wednesday, May 6th. We will discuss handing out materials to the neighborhoods. We've got a lot of ground to cover, so even if you can help get a flier to one neighbor, that'll do. Besides the weather is starting to improve and this might give you a food reason for a walk.

Here's the place:


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hope to see you there!!