Midtown’s Renaissance, Minneapolis

The power of community collaboration

When the mammoth Sears tower closed in 1994, it left a hole along Minneapolis’s historic Lake Street that sapped the strength of nearby businesses and neighborhoods. And quite a hole it was—1.2 million square feet of space, the largest building in the city and second only to the Mall of America as the largest in the state.

In 2001 the City of Minneapolis acquired the site and the Metropolitan Council formed a public-private partnership to spur redevelopment of the site and revitalization of the surrounding area. In addition to the major roles that community and private developers played, the commitment of large anchoring institutions like Abbott Northwestern Hospital, Wells Fargo Bank, Children’s Hospital, and Allina brought jobs, resources, and leadership in public safety.

Four years later, Minnesota Business Monthly named Midtown the Best Neighborhood Redevelopment Effort of 2005. The project’s success echoed in data showing that from 1999 to 2005, estimated market value per acre more than doubled in the area.

In a spectacular $130 million redevelopment, the Sears tower was transformed into the Midtown Exchange, which contains a new Sheraton Hotel, the Allina healthcare organization’s headquarters, hundreds of stylish apartments and condominiums, and a busy global market. This enormous project serves as a cornerstone and catalyst for the neighborhood—bringing together jobs, homes, and activities, and sparking other improvements like the new Midtown Greenway, the Midtown Farmers’ Market, and the rebirth of small businesses on Lake Street. In addition, the recent repaving of Lake Street provided another opportunity to rethink automobile and pedestrian traffic from a community and business development perspective. For the first time in decades, Midtown is now a competing brand with downtown and Uptown—an interesting destination with a global vibe.