The Freets emailed me and said he was up for a Run Minneapolis segment. He stopped by on Saturday afternoon for a quick drive up to the crazy corner at the East end of the Franklin Ave Bridge for a run through the University of Minnesota.
From there, we went North on 27th Ave SE across University Ave SE. What’s up with areas of town where two streets with the same directionals cross? That’s non-Euclidian geometry.
We then took a left on 4th and headed toward the under-construction TCF Bank Stadium. Looks like there are plenty of skyboxes for undergrads or corporations or whoever has money by the time this thing is finished. It’s good to see TCF’s ATM fees coming around in some form here:
The stadium does look impressive and like a great improvement over the Metrodome for U of MN football. I just with TCF Bank had covered more than the cost of putting their name on the building.
A bit further west, we passed Bierman Field where athletes prove themselves in a test against a clock (it’s not a game):
When we got close to the heart of Dinkytown, we took a right at 15th Ave SE, then a left on 8th Ave SE where we spotted some Shoefiti:
A bit further down 8th, we crossed I-35W. Looking South from there, we saw the last exit to 35W before crossing the Mississippi River. I wonder how many people took that exit in the minutes before the bridge collapse?
A few blocks later, we took a left on 7th and cut underneath the new 35W bridge. Here’s The Freets pointing out that the new bridge does indeed exist:
On University Ave, we passed the Dinky Dome (former home of the Minnesota Bible College) which is going to be going be renovated and connected to new apartments in development. I used to hit the Taco Bell.
We took Church Street SE and ended up at a dead end. After that, we worked our way down to the river past Coffmann Union:
Cass Gilbert’s original plan for the U of MN campus didn’t include Coffman Union. The idea was for the mall of the U of MN campus to run from Northrup all the way to the Mississippi River. Well, that didn’t last.
Here’s a blurry map I shot with my Treo (along with the above photos):
And a digital thing from MapMyRun.com:
FYI, the five-way intersection is currently being revisioned by Hennepin County, Minneapolis, and their consultant SEH. I attended the study kickoff meeting last week – it was uneventful, but sufficient & typical for these sorts of meetings. Incidentally, this intersection was also the subject of my Civil Engineering MS thesis.
http://www.sehinc.com/online/franklin/index.htm
Hark! Doth yonder bridge appear?
@Reuben Collins – thankfully that intersection is being revisioned, it’s a pain. Ed mentioned the revision, too, as we were beginning our run.