Minneapolis getting closer to the 400K Mark (Plymouth, Eagan: co-ops, living in)

[Min-Chi-Cbus]

Originally Posted by golfgal

Well, first of all you are considering all of Minneapolis is "Urban" and it's not, most of Minneapolis is far from "Urban". Parts of Bloomington are far more Urban than most of the suburban-like areas of Minneapolis . Other inner ring suburbs would be equally "Urban" if you count South Minneapolis as "Urban"....it's just not that cut and dried..

I'll bite: which parts of Bloomington are more urban than Minneapolis?

No normal person is going to call any development in say the Kenny neighborhood of Minneapolis as "suburban", not in a million years. Let's at least draw the line at the cities themselves. Even if we didn't, and we drew the line at say 38th Street South in Minneapolis, 90% or more of the development in that city is north of there, and certainly south of say Broadway on the North Side.

[srsmn]

Originally Posted by golfgal

Well, if you traveled more, you would understand. The only real "urban" neighborhoods in Minneapolis are downtown for the most part. I guess I don't know why you would think otherwise when you already admitted that it isn't like NY, Chicago, but I'll add Boston, Washington DC, LA, Dallas, St. Louis, Atlanta, etc, etc, etc....

DC and Boston, yes. Dallas, not by a long shot. St. Louis is denser in the core and falls out pretty fast past the parks. Atlanta I've never been to, but I've never heard anybody call it particularly urban. LA is approximately the same population density and structural density of Minneapolis.....just spread out over eight times as much space.

I have been to (and I'll try not to forget any here): the Twin Cities (where I grew up), Milwaukee, Chicago (dozens of times), Pittsburgh, Boston, Baltimore, Philadelphia, Washington, San Francisco, LA, Detroit, Cleveland, Indianapolis, Omaha, Des Moines, Miami, Tampa, Memphis, Nashville, Dallas, Houston, Austin, Portland, Seattle, Denver, St. Louis and Kansas City. Of those, only Chicago, Boston, Baltimore, San Fran, Philly and Washington are head and shoulders "more urban" than Minneapolis. The rest are a push, at best.

I'm curious still about specific neighborhoods that you find suburban in Minneapolis, as compared to other large cities in America. Or, maybe even more specifically, what is the definition of "urban" for you? Everybody's is different. Does Minneapolis have the densest downtown core in America? No, not by a long shot, and certainly not outside of the CBD between Marquette and Hennepin, 10th St. and Washington. But the residential areas are really pretty dense city-wide. The population density data supports this, and some neighborhoods (Loring Park comes to mind, or Cedar Riverside) are as structurally dense as you'll find anywhere in the country, albeit over a small amount of land....

[Beenhere4ever]

It is useless to start applying urban and suburbun to "areas" of an inner city. Is Central Park in NY "suburban" due to lack of housing or industry?

[PackerFan1]

I am glad to hear that the Twin Cities is gaining population both in city propers. The suburbs are great also but there has to be a balance between the cities and suburbs in order for the city to prosper and to remain competitive. That way the metro area will stay stable.

[xandrex]

Originally Posted by Beenhere4ever

Maybe. I would say a county like Dakota that is entirely suburban is plenty suburban. A county with so much URBAN population like Hennepin is not so suburban. In fact, it is the very definition of an urban county having the most urban residents in the state. Size of the suburban area can't be the determining point.

Here's some demographics:

Hennepin: 2012 est. 1,184,576
Minneapolis: 392,880
Bloomington: 82,893
Minneapolis+Bloomington: 475,773

Urban/Suburban: 40 percent.

I'd guess that 40 percent is the most "urban" in the state. Possibly St Cloud's county is more so with only rural populations around. But I'd counter that Hennepin is "plenty urban".

Why would Bloomington be considered urban? It's a big city, yes...but that doesn't make it particularly urban. Apple Valley is actually more dense than Bloomington overall, yet nobody is going to call Apple Valley urban. It's not just population, but also the size of the area where we're counting the people.

And while Hennepin is certainly more urban than, say, Carlton County, the majority of both its landmass and population is suburban.

[emcee squared]

Originally Posted by golfgal

Well, if you traveled more, you would understand. The only real "urban" neighborhoods in Minneapolis are downtown for the most part. I guess I don't know why you would think otherwise when you already admitted that it isn't like NY, Chicago, but I'll add Boston, Washington DC, LA, Dallas, St. Louis, Atlanta, etc, etc, etc....

Atlanta urban? I'm sorry, the city proper is less dense than the suburb I'm currently living in. There are 10,000 sq. ft. homes on large wooded lots only several miles away from Midtown and Buckhead.

There are pockets of urbanity along a few mile corridor in the city, and a few moderate density edge cities. That is it. If you consider Atlanta urban, you must consider Minneapolis urban.

[golfgal]

Originally Posted by emcee squared

Atlanta urban? I'm sorry, the city proper is less dense than the suburb I'm currently living in. There are 10,000 sq. ft. homes on large wooded lots only several miles away from Midtown and Buckhead.

There are pockets of urbanity along a few mile corridor in the city, and a few moderate density edge cities. That is it. If you consider Atlanta urban, you must consider Minneapolis urban.

I don't consider either Urban...not in the true sense of Urban living like you see in NY, Boston, DC, etc.....Minneapolis is far from Urban..people just like to think it is....

[Beenhere4ever]

Originally Posted by xandrex

Why would Bloomington be considered urban? It's a big city, yes...but that doesn't make it particularly urban. Apple Valley is actually more dense than Bloomington overall, yet nobody is going to call Apple Valley urban. It's not just population, but also the size of the area where we're counting the people.

And while Hennepin is certainly more urban than, say, Carlton County, the majority of both its landmass and population is suburban.

That's a totally valid perspective. So lets call Hennepin a suburban county for the most part.

[srsmn]

Originally Posted by golfgal

I don't consider either Urban...not in the true sense of Urban living like you see in NY, Boston, DC, etc.....Minneapolis is far from Urban..people just like to think it is....

Gee, that list got shorter. What happened to Dallas and Atlanta?

So Minneapolis is less "urban" than three of the highest population density large cities in the country, ergo it's not urban at all? Yeah....that makes perfect sense....


BTW, add Phoenix to my list of large cities I've been to that Minneapolis is decidedly more urban in terms of built environment than. I forgot it earlier...

[Min-Chi-Cbus]

Originally Posted by xandrex

Why would Bloomington be considered urban? It's a big city, yes...but that doesn't make it particularly urban. Apple Valley is actually more dense than Bloomington overall, yet nobody is going to call Apple Valley urban. It's not just population, but also the size of the area where we're counting the people.

And while Hennepin is certainly more urban than, say, Carlton County, the majority of both its landmass and population is suburban.

Nobody asked me, and mine is only just another person's opinion, but here's some factors I'd personally use to describe "urban":

-moderate/high population density (>=4,000 ppsm)
-moderate/high infrastructure density (e.g. housing on smaller lots -- <= 1/4 to 1/8 of an acre)
-streets use a grid system (maximized infrastrucure density in most cases, and is prototypically urban in U.S.)
-higher proportion of non-corporate businesses (e.g. fewer chains or big boxes)
-mix of zoning uses (businesses in n'hoods on street corners or mixed in with housing on the same block)
-parking on streets, behind buildings, or in ramps above or underground (no open lots, not typically in front of bldgs)
-presence of sidewalks
-garages tucked behind houses so you can't see them or existance of alleyways
-houses have shorter setbacks (the closer to the sidewalks the more urban)
-presence of mid-rises or high-rises
-lots of people outside ("eyes on the street", a sense of close-knit neighborhoods, and walkability)
-adults on bicycles (doesn't matter if they're nice bikes or bad ones, some adults don't drive for whatever reason)
-presence of neighborhood or pocket parks (these parks have no/few parking spaces)


I'm sure I could go on and on, but these are just some ideas (even if some aren't universally agreed-upon or apply to areas that are typically more "suburban"). Not all of them on their own make the area they are within "urban" (in fact, almost none of them are this way, including population density), but together they start to make a stronger case for "urban" over "suburban".

Based on this list, you could argue that the Eastern half or third of Bloomington is borderline "urban", while the western half or two-thirds is "suburban". The difference being things like walkability, street grids, the presence of sidewalks, the presence of mixed zoning uses on the same street, etc.