Photo by Joe Szurszewski

Bewiched Deli co-owner Mike Ryan offers 2-year-old Isabelle Einess candy during the North Loop Kids organization’s daytime trick-or-treating program.

By Michelle Bruch

A couple of hundred children are becoming Downtown’s youngest urban pioneers.

Eleven-year-old Kira learned to ride her bike underneath the I-94 exit ramps. One-year-old Magnus visits monthly “Baby Loves Disco” events at Trocaderos. Kaiya and Abrea, ages 5 and 7, had an early introduction to the Walker Art Center. Four-month-old Aryanna is taking a class for infants at the MacPhail Center. One-month-old Meridel has already been kicked out of a bar.

Parents said they raise kids Downtown for some of the same reasons they moved here in the first place.

“We love being in the city,” said Scott Woller, the father of Kaiya and Abrea and the owner of Corner Coffee in the North Loop. “The cool things that we get to do culturally and as a family are great. We’re not sitting there going, ‘I wish we had a big yard to mow.’”

Anna Gillette and her husband decided to relocate here from Southwest Minneapolis for the convenience of condo life.

“We had an old historic home, and we’re not very handy people,” Gillette explained. “We both worked full time, and we did not have a lot have a lot of quality time together. Especially once we had kids, we didn’t want a lot of extra responsibilities.”

Anna Larsson said she and her husband never considered leaving Downtown to start a family. They have lived in Philadelphia and New York, and they have seen plenty of other families raise children in the city.

“There was no debate, no question,” Larsson said. She and her husband continued walking to work, and their loft neighbors were excited to become aunties and uncles.

“We had a fabulously welcoming community,”
she said.

“People are always shocked that we live Downtown,” said Nassim, the mother of two daughters ages 3 years and 4 months. She finds it interesting that there is so much resistance to raising kids Downtown, when people do it in so many other cities across the country.

“My advice would be to not be afraid,” she said.

Wendy Holmes said Downtown was an easy choice for her family because she and her husband live close to work, and her daughter Kira is close to her school: Marcy Open is located just across the Hennepin Avenue bridge.

She said that contrary to popular belief, there are an abundance of school choices for kids who live Downtown. For example, a child that lived at 8th Street & Nicollet Mall might have busing available to six different community schools, 11 magnet schools, and three charter schools.

Of course, Downtown is not without its challenges.

Some parents are skeptical about the quality of public schools here. Nassim said that unless her family decides to enroll her children in private school, they will move to Edina.

“That’s the one thing that could kick us out of Downtown,” she said.

Additionally, living space can be a bit confining — although there’s no need for baby monitors in open-air lofts. Mothers who live here said they have to keep their homes free of clutter.

“You really don’t need as much stuff as you think you do,” said Amber Woller, the mother of two daughters.

Another challenge is securing a spot in daycares that are crowded with commuters’ children. Larsson visited all of the Downtown daycare providers and put her name on all of the waiting lists but only found a spot at the YWCA for Magnus two weeks before she needed to go back to work.

YWCA Program Coordinator Laurie Krulc recommended that parents get on the waiting list for daycare as soon as they find out they are pregnant. The YWCA only takes 18 infants at a time — one teacher is assigned to every three infants — and children do not graduate into toddler care until they hit 16 months of age.

“Infant spaces are really at a premium, and our waiting list actually goes into next August,” Krulc said.

When it comes to safety, Gillette said she has always lived in urban areas, so caution is part of her lifestyle.

“This is the city, and I have a realistic attitude about it,” Gillette said. “But I’m not
paranoid.”

Scott Woller said the North Loop neighborhood has always felt safe to him, but, of course, his family isn’t hanging around bars at 2 a.m.

“Kids don’t just wander in the suburbs either when they are 7 years old,” he said.

Holmes said her daughter stays on the block when she plays outside, and she must stay in the house if her parents aren’t home.

Longtime Elliot Park resident Julie Kearns, mother of a 1-month-old daughter, said she feels safe in the neighborhood.

“Ten years ago, I wouldn’t have been comfortable having a child living down here,” she said. “Things have changed a lot. I think if we were to see things head in the other direction, [we] would have to talk about it. But, at this point, we know a lot of our neighbors, people watch out for each other, and the crime rates do feel like they’ve gone down in the time that I’ve been here, so my tolerance is pretty healthy here.”

Back in the late 1990s, Kearns said she was regularly aware of issues like prostitution, drug dealing, car theft, break-ins and robberies. Now both the frequency and severity of issues seem significantly lower, she said, amounting to occasional theft and rowdy tailgaters. Kearns said new housing and businesses have brought more foot traffic and more eyes to the street.

Parents’ biggest complaint in the North Loop is they lack a playground where they can let their children loose to play. Loring Park is a bit of a hike, and the playground equipment at Boom Island is dubbed “Splinter Park.”

A new group called North Loop Kids is working on that, however. Larsson said she is arranging a meeting with the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board in order to understand the process for building a playground in the North Loop.

One of the most common questions Downtown parents answer is where their children can play if they don’t have
backyards.

Kira hangs out at coffee shops and plays in the green space between 710, 720, and 730 Lofts. She and her family enjoy biking down to West River Road.

“She loves having her friends over because they think it’s really cool to be able to see when you’re up high in the building and see the whole city in front of you,” Holmes said.

Magnus listens to stories at the children’s room of the Central Library and takes walks with his parents every weekend across the Stone Arch Bridge.

Kaiya and Abrea play on the Loring Greenway’s playground and occasionally visit Elliot Park. The Elliot Park Recreation Center is always hopping with kids playing basketball and using the pool and skate park.

A new store in the North Loop called local D’lish has kid-sized shopping carts, a popular spinning chair and toys geared toward cooking.

“There are a lot more kids here than people think,” said Owner Ann Yin.

The handful of children that live Downtown didn’t hurt for candy on Halloween. Kids in the North Loop trick-or-treated at the 801 Washington Lofts, and neighborhood businesses served up candy throughout the day.

Kearns said she is seeing more young families now than she has ever seen before Downtown.

“I do think it’s going to be an increasing trend,” she said. “I can tell you that we see a lot of strollers out at happy hours.”


Reach Michelle Bruch at 436-4372 or mbruch@mnpubs.com