On Monday May 5, Columbia Heights Mayor Amáda Márquez Simula and several City Council members stayed in City Hall long past sundown, discussing ongoing projects with potential to reshape the city.
The bulk of the meeting centered around three presentations. Representatives from a local housing developer spoke first; they were followed by the Minnesota Department of Transportation; and the third explored parking issues on Peters Place and Gould Avenue.
Rainbow site proposal
In 2021, Columbia Heights teamed up with Alatus, a housing developer whose projects stretch across the greater Twin Cities area, to work on a mixed-use development project on a 13-acre plot of land located at 4300 Central Ave. (The company also spearheaded Ratio, an apartment building in Columbia Heights that has become the best-performing item in their portfolio.) According to the Columbia Heights website, the project “would be the biggest development project in Columbia Heights in 100 years.” The development has yet to materialize, however, due to a mixture of delays, rising interest rates and recent shifts in the global supply chain.
Tony Keithley, Alatus president, said the project required him to be “creative.”
“The Twin Cities housing market would normally develop around 10,000 to 12,000 apartment units a year,” he said. “This year, it’s going to be 2,400 apartment units, and it’s probably going to be less than 2,000. So there’s all this pent-up demand — and we can’t just deliver it at a rate that’s achievable for a lot of people.” If the current proposal goes through, Columbia Heights’s housing market could see up to 600 new apartments.
In addition to the new units, the development is slated to include a new grocery store, two levels of underground parking and space for new retail storefronts. City Council Member Connie Buesgens requested that Alatus abandon their plans to include the grocery store, saying that “the market’s just not there” for them. Keithley said that he is currently in talks with 35 different grocery stores: “That spot’s not going to be the hang-up.”
Barrett Corwin, Alatus’ director of development, said they intend to move forward with the project despite the hurdles. In the “best case scenario,” he said, “we’re in the ground next spring. That is not off the table. A lot is going to evolve quickly.”
One option for the Central Avenue redevelopment. This proposal, which is favored by MnDOT, has one dedicated lane for cars and another dedicated lane for buses. (Courtesy of MnDOT)
Central Avenue redevelopment
The Minnesota Department of Transportation was up next. Chris Bower, MnDOT’s North Area engineer, walked the mayor and city council through a proposed reconstruction of Central Avenue. The proposal is still in its early stages, so they are considering a range of ideas: a single northbound lane; a two-lane road with one bus-only lane; and two mixed-use lanes.
MnDOT is suggesting a single northbound lane that stretches from 45th and Central to 49th and Central. A few City Council members expressed concern about bus-only lanes, saying such a rule would be challenging to enforce.
MnDOT also discussed changing the intersections with traffic signals on 49th, 51st and 53rd Avenue to roundabouts, claiming that such a change would both make pedestrians safer and improve the flow of traffic. (Their presentation materials claimed that “we have more serious and fatal crashes in the Hilltop area than anywhere else on Central.”)
The updates to Central Avenue will have an overflow effect on nearby roads, but Bower said that they couldn’t predict that impact with certainty. MnDOT considers the Central Avenue redesign as a sort of case study for future developments. For example, they spoke briefly about reworking University Avenue, but they will not make any decisions about that road until this project is a few years in the rearview. Bower suggested delaying intersection work on University until the mid-2030s.
While the council didn’t fully agree on which options made the most sense for Central, they all agreed that improving safety for residents was paramount. As Bower repeatedly emphasized, many of the traffic ideas proposed have not been implemented at this scale in the United States — which makes it challenging to find case studies or know a clear path forward. “We’re pushing the envelope” with this proposal, City Council Member Connie Buesgens said. “It’s a paradigm shift for the city.”
MnDOT plans to host monthly public meetings every second Thursday at the Columbia Heights Public Library.
Parking near Central Avenue
Peters Place is just a few blocks away from businesses and city buildings along Central Avenue, such as the Columbia Heights Public Library, the Heights Theater and several restaurants, but it is predominantly zoned for single-family and multi-family housing. This proximity has, over the years, led to Columbia Heights residents and visitors parking in the area, blocking driveways and clogging up an already narrow street. This congestion has potential knock-on effects, too — if cars are parked on both sides of Peters Place, emergency service vehicles and snowplows might not fit.
In January, the City created designated parking zones to help control this issue. The north frontage of Gould Avenue, as well as portions of Peters Place, have been designated “No Parking” zones. Based on the City’s observations, this seems to have been effective, particularly during the summer parking season. The Columbia Heights Police Department has been monitoring the new zones and has handed out a few tickets.
Columbia Heights has also reserved a 200-foot section of Gould Avenue for commercial parking, putting a three-hour limit on any vehicles parked there. That area — which stretches from Central Avenue to Peters Place — has proven challenging. Cars are parked bumper-to-bumper at most hours of the day, and there is no clear way to enforce the parking time limit at present. City Council members discussed the possibility of installing parking meters to help alleviate the problem, but they have not yet acted on the issue.