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Photo courtesy of Stock Roofing, a Tecta America Company
The green roof atop the Target Center is 2.5 acres.
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Development update: Target Center green roof
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By Amanda Kushner
Crews complete Target Center’s green roof project
The green roof on top of the Target Center is complete, and there was a ribbon cutting ceremony on Sept. 15.
Planting was completed the first weekend in August. The green roof was maintained and watered almost everyday during the summer, said Angie Durhman, a green roof manager with Tecta America. Tecta America has a 20-year contract with the owner to provide horticultural maintenance, she said.
The 2.5-acre green roof is the fifth largest extensive green roof in the country, and it’s also the first one installed on an arena in North America.
Sedums and Minnesota prairie plants were planted as a part of the roof. This includes lupine, which the endangered Karner Blue Butterfly needs to survive, wild strawberry and dotted blazing-star.
The plants are a pre-vegetated system, which was grown off-site in New York, Durhman said. The location was chosen because it was the closest farm with the best quality and similar climate conditions, she said.
Succulent plants were used because of the minimum amount of soil — 1 ¼ to 2 ½ inches — which was impacted by structural limitations of the building, Durhman said.
The roof is expected to capture about 1 million gallons of storm water, and help alleviate the heat island effect.
Durhman also pointed out that there is contrast between the sod at Target Field, which looks bright green when compared to the green roof at the Target Center. The difference in the physical look is because the green roof is a self-sustaining system.
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Skyway would link Flour Exchange Building and federal courthouse
A skyway is proposed to connect the back of the Flour Exchange building to the U.S. Federal Courthouse.
The proposed skyway lines up with the skyway in the Federal Courthouse, and David Heller, architect with Heller Architects, said the skyway would be minimal in design to avoid taking away from the Flour Exchange Building.
The Historic Preservation Commission, Downtown Council and Skyway Advisory Committee need to give their approval, said Heller, who said the Skyway Advisory Committee meeting in September and the Historic Preservation Commission is in October.
The proposed skyway asks for three variances from what is required by the Skyway Advisory Committee. The height requirements are 16 feet and 6 inches, but because of the building elevation this can’t be accomplished, Heller said. The requirement is a standard because of truck traffic and service underneath, but this skyway would stretch across an alley that is not a service alley, he said. The next variance is that the skyway proposes swinging doors instead of sliding doors because sliding doors won’t work as a fire rating, and they are trying to use an existing window opening in the Flour Exchange building to try and preserve the building, so the elevation and wall structure are not affected. Finally skyways are required to be 12 feet in width, but this skyway asks for closer to 10 feet because of the existing corridor in the Flour Exchange and in the courthouse.
When the plans were presented to the Downtown Minneapolis Neighborhood Association, the association approved a letter of support, but only if power-assisted doors are included.
“I think they did their job in the sense that they were there to either approve or give a blessing to the overall skyway, but they are not necessarily there to deal with code issues,” Heller said.
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Minnesota Shubert Center groundbreaking Nov. 19
A ceremony on Nov. 19 will celebrate the Minnesota Shubert Center’s groundbreaking.
The event will start at 12:30 p.m. in the lot between the Hennepin Center for the Arts and the Shubert Theater on Hennepin Avenue. Executive Director Colin Hamilton said the mayor is expected to speak and that it will be a lively event with dancing.
Construction on the Shubert is expected to be completed by early 2011, and it will connect dance teachers and students, house dance schools, have 10 dance studios for rehearsal space and provide 20 nonprofit organizations with office space. The Shubert Theater, designed for dancers, will include a sprung floor, a fly-loft and sightlines. Hamilton said the most immediate work will be starting on the theater. Construction will create about 100 jobs, he said.
“It is just a wonderful moment to be able to think not about how to get to groundbreaking, but what is the center going to offer to the community once it opens,” Hamilton said.
Artspace Projects, headquartered in Minneapolis, is designing the project.
Reach Amanda Kushner at akushner@mnpubs.com.
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Carmichael Lynch drops Harley account
UPDATED August 30, 2010, 2:29pm
By Gregory J. Scott
When it comes to selling muscle bikes, three decades is enough. Downtown advertising agency Carmichael Lynch announced August 23 that it was resigning from its Harley-Davidson account, ending a relationship of 31 years with the iconic motorcycle brand. In a prepared statement, Doug Spong, president of Carmichael Lynch, said, "Our agency leadership came to the consensus that we've taken the Harley-Davidson brand as far as we can. It's in our best interest to part ways." Mark-Hans Richer, Harley’s CMO, said, "Our strategies have been moving away from a singular consumer target and a one-size-fits-all agency solution. Rather than accept this new reality, Carmichael Lynch chose a different path and we respect that." The
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Community notebook :: Florence Court apartments
By Gregory J. Scott
1 Comment
At Florence Court, new apartments up, courtyard staysThe mid-August groundbreaking came and went quietly for the FloCo Fusion Apartments, a chic rebranding of a ramshackle cluster of student housing near the University of Minnesota’s East Bank campus. Despite years of resistance from current residents, the new building is officially going up, fanfare or no. Florence Court, as the community used to be called, is one of the oldest apartment buildings in the Midwest, dating back to 1886. The L-shaped structure sits at the intersection of 10th Avenue SE and University Avenue, but is tucked back from the street, hidden until recently behind a BP gas station. The 33-unit complex surrounds a leafy courtyard, which its residents — a colorful
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Watching out for the homeless
By Sarah McKenzie
// Volunteer outreach worker Jerry Fleischaker honored with prestigious McKnight award //After Jerry Fleischaker’s wife died of Alzheimer’s disease, he came across a newspaper article about St. Stephen’s Human Services’ work reaching out to homeless people with mental health issues. The story inspired him to start volunteering for St. Stephen’s. Now the 79-year-old retired pharmaceutical sales representative volunteers full time for the Downtown-based organization. “My wife died of Alzheimer’s in 2002. I saw the care she needed,” Fleischaker told Monica Nilsson, director of street outreach and community education for St. Stephen’s. “I was haunted by the thought that people might be
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Downtown visioning session looks to 2025
By jake weyer
// Whether to add a park north of Central Library will be part of the discussion, meant to produce a 15-year plan for Downtown //It’s been nearly 15 years since Downtown business leaders got together with city staff and elected officials to hash out a long-term plan for the area. Back in 1996, those stakeholders came up with Downtown 2010, a vision that included such grandiose plans as a new ballpark for the Minnesota Twins, a light rail line along Hiawatha Avenue, a new Central Library, completion of the Target Center and the development of the Downtown Improvement District — all realities today. “We’re standing now, planless,” said Sam Grabarski, president of the Downtown Council. “And a lot of good
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A mountain out of a bronze molehill?
By Gregory J. Scott
// The Sid Hartman statue stirs debate about public memorials Downtown //
OK, no one disputes that the guy deserves a statue. Sid Hartman, the nonagenarian sportswriter who has spent the last 65 years reporting for the Star Tribune and WCCO, is probably getting bronzed. The Department of Public Works is ironing out technical details for installing a metallic Sid replica, complete with TV reporter microphone and newspaper tucked under the arm, right outside of Target Center and a block from the Twins stadium, at the corner of 6th Street and 1st Avenue. The Public Works assessment is the final stage in a roughly six-week approval process to get the statue out into the public. No one’s upset about that. As Nick Legeros, the artist who designed
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Biz buzz :: Construction costing Elliot Park businesses
By Gregory J. Scott
1 Comment
For Elliot Park businesses, street improvements come with a price
True to its motto, Band Box Diner can turn “grease into a feast.” But the Elliot Park gem can’t make much out of the road construction that’s transformed its streetscape into a scarred industrial zone.
The throw-back diner is one of the businesses standing to benefit from a sweeping, 15-block reconstruction of Chicago Avenue South — if only it can survive through to the project’s completion.
“It’s kind of like, if you have a half hour for lunch, and then you get lost for 45 minutes, what are you gonna do?” says Brad Ptacek, who has operated the diner for the last 13 years.
Ptacek’s breakfast
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