Today was a perfect weather day, to join the dignitaries and leaders of Minneapolis and Hennepin County, in the 90th anniversary re-dedication ceremony of Victory Memorial Parkway. The signs still say "parkway" but it's now known as Victory Memorial "DRIVE". There was a 10k Run, music, aircraft flyovers, and more. I took photos and videos as long as my memory cards had space. (edit in video and photosynth soon!)
Looking south, Victory Memorial Parkway forms the Northwest corner of Minneapolis.
They had them working just in time for the Northern Spark fest! The new 700,000 LEDlightsystem, on the Target Headquarters building downtown, is dazzling. They'll provide a fresh dose of awesomeness to popular events in the same way Google changes it's logo for special days.
It's been a day of historic HEAT! We reached a record high of 97 in today Minneapolis.
Now weather reporters are warning it will be HOTTER tomorrow! We are under an excessive heat warning for the next 24 hours. Freeways have already buckled in at least 3 places. NOAA is warning of 100 degree temps, with possible haze reaching us all the way from the Arizona wild fires!
Showers and thunderstorms are expected to impact the region once again today, mainly during the evening hours. Storms should re-develop across portions of eastern South Dakota into northern Nebraska during the mid-late afternoon, then move east into west central Minnesota during the early evening. The storms are then expected to continue to move east across central Minnesota during the evening, and eventually toward the I-35 corridor by around midnight. Severe weather appears most likely across west central Minnesota into central Minnesota, with the storms likely weakening as they move into the eastern part of the state. Large hail and damaging winds are expected with any severe storms, and a few tornadoes are also possible, mainly west of a line from Redwood Falls to Little Falls prior to 10 PM CDT
The death toll from Sunday's tornado has risen to 122, making it the eighth-deadliest tornado in U.S. history, the National Weather Service said.
The Joplin twister was upgraded to EF-5, the strongest category on the Enhanced Fujita Scale, with winds exceeding 200 mph. The storm was apparently a "multivortex" tornado, with two or more small and intense centers of rotation orbiting the larger funnel, a rare occurrence.
U.S Attorney General Eric Holder's efforts to talk about youth violence prevention kept being interrupted by several anti-war peace activists sitting in the crowd. They were among those whose homes and offices had been raided by the FBI on Sept. 24, 2010 in a case involving, "providing material support to terrorism," according to the search warrants.
They stood to question Holder about why they are being investigated. Holder told the first protester, Tracy Molm, that he would be happy to talk with her after his speech.
About a half hour later, after several more interruptions from other protesters, Holder was forced to resign from the stage, and retreated to a back room.
Holder then spoke briefly with Tracy Molm. She said he gave her about three minutes, did not answer her questions and told her, "we'll have to agree to disagree."
Holder is scheduled to meet later today with members of Minneapolis' Somali community at Augsburg College where he will perhaps meet with the same fate.
The site also has a list/map of residents in immediate need of food or other help. It's an innovative way for volunteers and neighbors to see where efforts would be best directed.
As reported by an eye witness. Man with gun holds 2 people Hostage on Nicollet. Minneapolis, Minnesota
Barricaded Armed Subject- Minneapolis
PTAC 1 Nicollet Exchange Bldg 1801 Nicollet Ave Subject barricaded in lobby with handgun. Hennepin County Property Security has subject on camera inside building. SWAT & negotiators on scene.
Subject incustody- enroute to hospital by EMS. On May 23, 4:36 pm,
This is the first of several updates from the City of Minneapolis, please head their instructions.
Tornado response update- restricted zones on the North Side
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This morning the Minneapolis Police Department in cooperation with other City departments has developed anexclusion zone in the hardest hit areas of North Minneapolis into which only residents will be allowed once the areas are considered to be safe.
Currently crews are in the area repairing gas leaks, clearing roads, locating and neutralizing downed power lines and assessing the damage to buildings. This work will continue through the day until it is complete. As such it is necessary to prohibit all access to a block until that block is considered safe. Once a block is considered safe residents of that block can enter the area through one of the designated checkpoints.
Checkpoints are located at the following intersections:
Checkpoints are located at the following intersections:
42 Avenue North and Lyndale Avenue North
Dowling Avenue North and Lyndale Avenue North
Lowry Avenue North and Lyndale Avenue North
26th Avenue North and Fremont Avenue North
West Broadway and Fremont Avenue North
Penn Avenue North and Golden Valley Road
Oak Park/ Thomas Avenue North
Golden Valley Road and Xerxes Avenue South
Penn Avenue North and 12th Avenue North
Penn Avenue North and 26th Avenue North
Penn Avenue North and Lowry Avenue North
Penn Avenue North and Dowling Avenue North
42nd Avenue North and Humboldt Avenue North
MPD says that no checkpoint will open before 10 a.m. and no travel will be allowed in the exclusion zone before 10 AM. Then, only residents will be allowed to come and go after the areas have been cleared of major hazards. Anyone in the North Minneapolis area should be aware that emergency responders have found quantities of small debris that have damaged numerous vehicle tires.
Other Closures:
The following exits from northbound I-94 will also be closed until further notice starting at 5 a.m. Monday (on ramps are not affected):
Broadway/Washington Avenue
Dowling Avenue
49th Avenue North /53rd Avenue North
The Minneapolis Public School District says the following schools in the exclusion zone will be closed Monday:
Lucy Laney
City View
Nellie Stone Johnson
Hmong International Academy
Northstar
Plymouth Youth Center
No school buses will be able to enter the exclusion zone as many roadways are still impassable.
There is extensive damage following todays North Minneapolis Tornado. Many large trees are down, PERHAPS THOUSANDS, along with power lines, making motored vehicular travel difficult.
The Cities "North side" (west of the Mississippi) is closed! It's been reported there are 24 deputies who have set up a command post.
Now, residence are worried about a night of crime. Just before 10pm it was reported that police were preparing to enforce curfew, with gas masks and crowd control gear, as a liquor store was being looted.
Other damage reported include a train derailment near Water Works, north of Camden.
A construction crane was reported toppled.
There were reports of a large scale gas leak, elsewhere.
I will now check my YouTube resources and post as I find...
Minneapolis officials announced Monday, a proposal to build a new stadium for the Minnesota Vikings on the current Metrodome site. The plan calls for the city to pay roughly 25 percent of the cost.
City officials have scheduled an afternoon news conference at the State Capitol to outline details of the proposal. The city is competing with Ramsey County, which wants the Vikings to build in suburban Arden Hills.
The city plan would use sales taxes from the city's convention center and would provide additional money for renovation of Target Center, the downtown home of Minnesota Timberwolves NBA basketball. The proposal would also change the debt structure for Target Center.
Supposedly, no city property taxes would be used for the Vikings stadium..
The latest estimate of the stadium's cost is just under $900 million.
Mayor R.T. Rybak and City Council President Barb Johnson met Friday with Zygi Wilf, the Vikings owner, and an official from the National Football League, but top city officials have until now kept details of the plan secret. More Stealth development.
Polls have consistently shown a significant majority of Minnesotans oppose using public subsidies to build a new stadium for the Vikings.
Stadium critics have also argued that public subsidies for the Vikings should not be approved at a time the state is making major cuts to programs for poor and disadvantaged Minnesotans.
The Vikings have played at the Metrodome in downtown Minneapolis since 1982 but have announced they would not renew the team's lease after the 2011 season. Wilf has insisted he is not interested in moving or selling the team.
Date: 05/08/2011 Time: 09:30 am - No Info The Center for Spirituality & Healing (CSH) and the Tibetan American Foundation of Minnesota (TAFM) will co-host a special Twin Cities visit by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama on May 8, 2011. The theme of His Holiness' visit, the first official trip to the state since 2001, will be "One Heart, One Mind, One Universe." The Minnesota visit features three planned events: Medicine Buddha Empowerment: A Tibetan Cultural and Spiritual Ceremony May 8, 2011 (9:30 - 11:30 a.m.) at Mariucci Arena hosted by TAFM
Peace Through Inner Peace: A Public Address featuring His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama May 8, 2011 (2 - 3:30 p.m.) at Mariucci Arena co-hosted by CSH and TAFM
Second International Tibetan Medicine Conference: Healing Mind & Body 9:00 a.m. - 7:30 p.m. May 9, 2011 at the University Radisson Hotel co-hosted by CSH and TAFM (*The Dalai Lama is not expected to be present for this conference.) ************************************** It's been about a decade since the Dalai Lama came to Minnesota, so expect to fight the crowds if you want to see him in person.
Otherwise, check out the live feeds below: Saturday @ 9:45-11:00 a.m. Speaking at St. Thomas
Excerpt from Star Tribune: A stealth plan to transform Minneapolis' ailing Block E into a gambling and entertainment hub that could draw millions of tourists from across the Upper Midwest is about to land at the State Capitol.
Alatus LLC, the Minneapolis developer that bought the downtown entertainment complex at a deep discount last summer, has been meeting quietly with downtown business leaders since last summer on plans for a Bellagio-style, state-run casino, along with privately owned retail and restaurants.
On Wednesday, company officials, along with House Rep. John Kriesel and Sam Grabarski, head of the Minneapolis Downtown Council, presented plans for the luxury casino they say will yield thousands of jobs and millions in sales -- all without public funding. The working name of the redevelopment: Minnesota Live.
Kriesel, a freshman Republican legislator from Cottage Grove, will carry the House bill needed to create a downtown casino. Like other Republicans, Kriesel opposes Gov. Mark Dayton's plan to raise taxes as a way of alleviating the state's $5 billion deficit, but said he could see expanded gambling as part of a final budget solution. Sen. Doug Magnus, an assistant majority leader, will carry the bill in the Senate. "I know the governor wants a little more revenue," Kriesel said. "You know what? I'm all about compromise." Magnus said he supports the proposal because "I really do believe a strong, vibrant Minneapolis is good. It's one of the keys to the state."
Magnus and Kriesel's task is a delicate one. Until now, casino gambling has been the exclusive province of the state's American Indian tribes, who until recently thought their biggest fight was against a proposal to put video slots at horse-racing tracks.
The bill faces some high hurdles. The GOP-dominated Legislature remains divided on expanded gambling. Minneapolis Mayor R.T. Rybak has said he does not support it.
4-29-2011 5pm. I left the Heights Library and followed the sent of smoke to a small fire a few blocks away. It looks like the home of the family that runs the Ecuadorian Cab Company is going to be lost to fire, smoke, and water damage. It was sad to see the kids sitting across the street from their family home, crying as it burned. Corner of 39th and Van Buren.
Following last years Collapse of the Metrodome, (the 4th such collapse in it's history) workers have been installing new light brown diamond shaped panels. Tours are allowing an early look.
In an operation designed to stop people from texting and driving, which is illegal in Minnesota and defined as "Distracted Driving", the Department of Defence partnered with Minneapolis police set up a check point and began stopping people who "looked distracted" and asking to search their cell phones!
I heard about it on KTLK this morning, but now I can't find any news about where the check point was precisely. Please leave a comment if you know.
Man, what the heck. The weather machines are really not being cool. I was going about, having a wonderful day, and then this news! 4 inches of snow in the city!? It better melt fast. dang-nabbit!
Here is continuing evidence of the weather modifications being done tecnologicaly.
Prediction based on weather modification signals in imagery data. NORTHERN MINNESOTA -- Tornados within 24-48 hours, based upon the appearing of the "rings" in conjunction with the "squares" or actually rectangles. These are ionic heater and scalar waveform technologies being used. BEWARE!
Notice, the current NOAA "Weather Story", does not indicate the potential for severe weather. We'll have to wait and see if this prediction is correct.
UPDATE 4/13/2011 Interestingly, Minnesota will hold a statewide "DRILL" for Tornado awareness, Thursday. Schools and businesses are encouraged to participate in the drill, which will happen at 1:45 p.m. and again at 6:55 p.m. Perhaps this is when severe conditions will further be triggered.
UPDATE 4/17/11 Well, there were not tornadoes in Minnesota but it did get unseasonably cold while all hell broke loose in the south. SOo. I was kind of an accurate prediction... kinda
ST. PAUL, Minn. -- Tuan Pham says he was just looking for a peaceful place to put his catholic-based prayer garden. He had a 7 foot Jesus statue custom made in his native Vietnam. He put it in his backyard, overlooking the Mississippi River and the St. Paul skyline.
Pham says he woke up Sunday morning to a wall of flames around his statue. "Right now I'm thinking and praying very hard," he said a few hours later. Family members say someone took wood from Pham's pile and placed it at the base of the statue before lighting it on fire. "You can see evidence on the ground, there's an aerosol can, and a mousepad" Pham's son-in-law Dao Phan said.
It may have burned for awhile; Pham's daughter took pictures of her father trying to knock down the flames. Fire investigators were going over the garden a few hours later. If they find evidence of arson, they are expected pass the case on to police.
"It pains me, it's very upsetting. This means a lot to him. This is where he finds joy and where he spends a lot of his time, and money" Phan said about his retired father-in-law.
The statue took months to ship. It is a replica of a massive one Pham helped build more than 40 years ago in his hometown of Vunh Tang Klahn, Vietnam. Pham says he was jailed for his catholic beliefs before he fled the country for Minnesota.
The statue was put in place last October and a month later, Phan says, the city received a complaint about it. The family requested a variance after officials found it was not the required 40 feet from the bluff line, but that request was denied by the city council a few days before the fire.
The family wonders if the fire was racially or religiously motivated, wondering why someone would try to burn marble; guessing it was merely meant to send a message. "Why does somebody need to go this far?" Phan wondered.
A St. Paul police spokesperson says the department's officers were not dispatched and did not respond to the fire. St. Paul Fire Marshall Steve Zaccard said before tending to the fire he was waiting on his investigators report.
Having a nice bike around today, I stopped in the Hawthorn neighborhood to sit atop FarView Parks hill for a while. A kind older gentleman showed up and engaged me in a little chat. He informed me the Blue Angels were going to fly over the city for the Minnesota Twins first home game of the season. It was a great place to wait and watch, but I opted to continue on. I didn't catch the Blue Angels, but I did snap some shots of the street life outside the ballpark.
It seems spring is finally here! For REAL this time. So I've been out pleasure riding in that past few days. I've notice some recent additions to the Nice Ride bike network. I took photos of 3 shiny new solar powered Nice Ride bike rack stations. There may be more. Get out and find them! It's beautiful outside.
Here are my discoveries.
Nicollet Mall & Grant Street Good location, in front of the Hyatt at the south gateway to Nicollet Mall.
Franklin & Nicollet Another convenient location a short walk south from the previous one.
University & Bank Street Across from the Lunds by the Ard Godfrey House.
These 3 location await the bikes. Have a nice ride!
Knowing the bright future of North Minneapolis (see the Mississippi Riverfront Development plan and TLS/KVAs RIVERFIRST Project) , it was inspiring to see the gathering of leadership, and active participants in the North Minneapolis business community, come together for an Economic Summit. Governor Mark Dayton was there to listen to the entrepreneurial and innovative solutions being offered and implemented by the community. The true future of North Minneapolis. Speakers and those present seemed symbolically aware that the challenges currently faced, are soon to be meet with justice. Both MplsMirror, and IBBN did good work covering the speakers.
by minnesotahistory on Mar 29, 2011 On Tuesday, March 29 a fluffy screech owl was found loose in the Minnesota History Center. He caused quite a stir, but the Minnesota Raptor Center safely brought him to their facility for evaluation and release. He was uninjured.
From KSTP: The latest flood predictions for the Mississippi River near Hastings show a crest level lower than previously predicted. The National Weather Service predicts the river will rise to about 18 feet by Thursday, March 31 and then start falling. Early last week, the river was predicted to hit the 20-foot level.
The NWS says river level will be lower than previous predictions due to colder temperatures and the slow snow melt along the upper Mississippi.
By 6 a.m. Monday, the river was at 16.8 feet, with minor flooding occurring. Flood stage is 15 feet.
The First Street railroad underpass is flooded and East Fourth Street in the river bottoms area will likely overtop Monday night as the river rises above 17 feet, says Tom Montgomery, Hastings Public Works Director.
On Saturday, volunteers filled 20,000 sandbags and sandbagged around two homes on East First Street. Montgomery says there are no plans to do more sandbagging at this time.
This year’s crest compares to a previous crest of 17.2 feet on March 25, 2010.
The Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome new fabric roof has arrived and replacing the torn roof will begin on Friday.
Consultants recommended a full replacement of the roof and insurance is picking up almost the whole tab.
Crews from Birdair, Inc. will work Monday through Saturday each week and the installation should be wrapped up in August, just in time for the Vikings preseason games.
A massive unexpected fire erupted out of a 20 inch gas main, Thursday morning at 8:30am. It was visible more then 4 miles away!
The explosion on 60th Street just east of Nicollet Avenue, forced the evacuation of nearby buildings – including a church, child care facility, and a school and homes — but no injuries have been reported. In a statement released Thursday morning, Houston-based CenterPoint Energy said it has crews on site and is investigating, but the cause of the explosion isn’t yet known. As a precaution, CenterPoint noted, emergency responders shut down Highway 62 and Interstate 35W. “It was a small explosion and then just a big ‘woomph,’” Solem said. “The flames shot a good eight stories tall, instantly. We were two blocks away and you could feel the heat instantly on your face.”
