doodledee

At its meeting last week, the Edina City Council fell to its knees and begged for mercy as it formally struck down the 'official' 44th and France redevelopment plan. I didn't go to the meeting, but reports from Commie Mike were that it was packed to the rafters again. I'm a little baffled by that, as it was pretty obvious after the first meeting that the council was going to trash the plan, but hey, maybe the Cool Kids Club Neighborhood Steering Committee wanted to milk this easy win for all the outrage they could.

The council voted 5-0 to remove the plan. Councilman Mike Kelly - yes, that Mike Kelly - whimpered a bit about how taking away the plan could theoretically open the neighborhood up to even yuckier development, but his arguments fell on deaf ears and he eventually sided with the winning team. Pussy.

As a bonus, everyone's favorite local over-hyped blowhard libertarian blogger Bob Smith decided to attend the meeting. A Man of the People, he seems to view the neighborhood's action as just another glorious chapter in the book of revolution. Summary: government trying to force feed people "planned" development is total bullshit.

I'll leave aside the fact that he twists the nature of the 44&F plan to be more sinister than it really is and that his utopian organic vision for residential business development seems to fly in the face of zoning regulations that are maintained by, who's that?, oh yeah, the government, but otherwise he says some good stuff. Why should the government be planning a community for me? Why not let it grow all fun and funky on its own? Why favor some business over others? Genius!

I wonder if it's hard for him to side with us cake eaters? Methinks it probably is.

I also wonder if he rages as hard against those gross-out exurban planned communities that aren't planned by a government per se but are planned just the same in that they favor certain businesses, they plan what types of buildings people will build, etc. It's not for me, but it's clearly for somebody, and who's to say it's wrong?

So now we're left without a plan and I have mixed feelings about that. It's great that the eminent domain crap has been flushed, but what's next? Sure, the area is zoned, and some of it is even borderline historic, but if some clownshow developer waltzes in with a big fancy plan and a dumptruck full of cash, who knows what'll happen. We've got nothing to fall back on. Maybe next time the neighborhood rallies it won't be for a fake reason after all.

44th and France Avenue removed from Development District [mnsun]
Eminent domain abuse is on the run [noforce]
turns out you can fight city hall [doodledee]