Commuting west of the TC (response to Small Towns WEST...) (Minneapolis: price, housing)

[Squeamish]

I wrote up this reply to the "Small Towns WEST of the Twin Cities" thread before noticing the thread was closed. I figured it was closed due to the argument at the end of the thread, which is entirely unrelated to my reply, as my reply is a direct response to the original post, so I thought in this case it was fair to post a new thread:

Beware of extra high housing cost anywhere close to Lake Minnetonka, except, from what I've heard, Mound is surprisingly reasonably priced. Also, driving from Minneapolis to Mound takes 45 minutes when it's NOT rush hour, no idea during rush hour but it's probably at least 1:15. Thanks to the slow 2-lane road that's pretty much the only option for miles. It blows my mind how many high-traffic long 2-lane roads we have in MN compared to most states...

Also note that once you get past 494 all of the highways become 2-lane with stoplights fairly quickly except 212 to the southwest or 94 to the northwest. I don't think any of them jam up that far out all that often, but I'm pretty sure you won't be going 55+ unless you're on 212 or 94. Other directions from Mpls (most notably south) have a lot faster highways going 20-30 miles out. However, going south to 212 or north to 94 you have to drive due north or due south for miles before you start heading west and it's a lot farther before you hit the country than if you drive due west on 12, so time-wise you'd still probably be in the country faster if you went west on 12.