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According to this article, the first in a two part series on Larry Laukka’s leading of UMore’s development, the University of Minnesota has tapped the expertise of a man who has developed 45 developments around the Twin Cities over the last 50 years.
The article states:
“Larry urged us to think big, bring in partners, consider innovative funding and fundraising options and invite signature architects to bid on the project,” Carlson said in an e-mail. “Nothing was easy and nothing was linear in this project that spanned a decade.”
That’s nice, I’m glad someone is thinking big for land development. What I’m not so pleased about is the fact that the University continues to tout its commercial gains by mining the land (which was once owned by real people before the government took it over to pollute it) and its future development (40 to 50 years down the road–long after Mr. Laukka is no longer with us). They continue to post footnotes about how they have to pay lip service to the numerous environmental issues which still plague the site.
Let’s cut the crap about sustainability and mass transit and instead switch the focus to what’s really important: ensuring that the land is safe and that the wrongs that the government committed all those years ago are righted. Oh and the money that the University is going to make from the land should not go into development of this area, it should go to funding scholarships, research and making UMore park an open and attractive park for everyone to enjoy–not just the 30,000 people they believe will make the 5,000 acre tract home. Let’s have another Dakota County park inhabit this once polluted area and allow everyone to enjoy the fruits of the millions the University is set to recoup from aggregate mining.
How about it folks? Is it right for the University to get into the business of creating communities or should they open this land which was stolen from local farmers/residents all those years ago, polluted, and then sold to the University for a dollar, to everyone for recreational use? Whatever you have to say about the University’s misguided vision for UMore Park go ahead and comment on as I’d love to hear what you have to say.
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March 2nd, 2010 at 10:47 am
I didn’t know that UMore had such an unpleasant history, do you have a link to some reading material on the history of the land?
Also, south metro area high school students will likely be disappointed by the loss of a prime make-out-and-smoke-weed spot.
March 2nd, 2010 at 10:57 am
I am personally very interested in seeing what the U comes up as the development ideas for UMore Park become more concrete and detailed. While I think developing a master plan for 10, 20, 30 years down the road is a good idea, I wonder whether it will conform to the reality of where development ends up in 10, 20, and 30 years. I have to think that many of the projections for development and population growth in the Twin Cities have been set back 5-10+ years based on the recession and the housing bubble of the last decade. We’re probably going to lose a congressional seat in the next decade – so where are those 1 million more people in the Twin Cities that everyone talked about not that long ago?
I think that mining some of the farmland is generally a good idea that will result in a revenue stream and might even end up in “rolling hills and lakes” etc etc.; but as Bill points out above, contamination is a serious issue. The first priority with any money made from mining should be to clean up any and all contaminated sites. Don’t spend the mining money on designing a pipe dream community that will need to be redesigned in 15 years; Don’t wait for the federal government to bail the sites out with Superfund money when people are on the doorstep of the contaminated sites. The U could profit immensely from this community and the development, but it needs to be responsible with the land rather than simply pocketing the mining money now and ignoring a huge problem.
March 2nd, 2010 at 11:54 am
Ryan,
You can start here for a good overview (page 15 for information on the displaced farmers).
I also did this post: http://www.lazylightning.org/gopher-ordnance-rosemount-mn a while back which includes a bit.
There are plenty of others out there. Search for UMore Lands, UMore Park, Gopher Ordnance Works, GOW Rosemount, etc.
March 2nd, 2010 at 4:55 pm
It really seems beyond the charge given to the University to develop this property. Development would be better accomplished by others. But just a general observation from a planning perspective: Any time someone owns a large swath of property on the urban fringe and they attempt to develop a sustainable community, the result is usually slightly re-packaged sprawl (i.e. Wal*Mart somewhat resembles a timber lodge). Sustainability, of course, is best accomplished within the urban center.
March 2nd, 2010 at 5:01 pm
Reuben,
As evidenced by the development of 45 other TC developments over 48 years, I’m guessing that his interests lie more outside of sustainability and more in line with sprawl. Great point. Thanks for bringing it up.
March 2nd, 2010 at 6:41 pm
I wish I could comment more, but in general the UofM is one of those Quasi-public institutions that seems to get away with whatever they want and I can’t get a clue on WTF they are actually doing.
I think the FED should be cleaning up the site. I know they have claimed they already have.
I think it’s a good thing they are going to mine the land. Mining local aggregate resources makes way more sense than building over them and then having local construction industry truck or train up quality aggregates from the south. Keeping base construction costs down is good for everyone. There is a old pit somewhere in Minnesota (I can’t recall the city ) that did turn out great after they were done. A fresh water lake and multi-family and single family and executive homes were developed on the property. A golf course. Dang, wish I could recall. The development was done about 15 years ago.
I do hope that their community building doesn’t go forward blindly without remembering there are already communities around there. Don’t try to operate like you are in a bubble. Instead try to leverage the public resource for a common public good, not just egghead good.
As far as who is in charge of the mess. Can he really do any worse than anyone else at the University? Once they decided they were gonna run it themselves, you can’t get much worse.
Hmm, I commented more.
March 2nd, 2010 at 10:25 pm
I wonder too how much some of those projections could be rolled back. Growth has really almost stopped compared to what we had five to ten years ago. When we first moved to Lakeville it seemed as though a new subdivision was popping up almost every other month. Now it’s almost stopped. I think it might be quite a while before people are itching to build their little utopia out there.
I personally think this development sounds pretty flaky. I say mine the place and then decide what to do with it in 2050 when the growth might actually happen. That or turn it into a big old park like Bill said. That would be cool, but if there is no cash in it for the U, they won’t even consider it.
March 3rd, 2010 at 6:30 am
UMN is making money from the aggregate mining. Lots of it.
January 31st, 2011 at 2:29 pm
Before going off on a rant about this project people should be looking at the history of quality development created under the management of Mr. Laukka. He is thoughtful and has a long range vision readily witnessed by the work he has already accomplished for the University of Minnesota. The task of growing this valuable asset to the community could not be in better hands. The suggestion Mr. Laukka is encouraging sprawl is uninformed. He has championed and developed projects that are more like cohesive urban neighborhoods and communities than typical penturban small-acre semi ranch home developments. His success is such he has nothing to gain from this job other than greater respect from a community in need of his creative land use ideas.