Hennepin County Regional Rail Authority contracted the services of transit experts HDR to facilitate a week-long workshop to develop a conceptual plan for the inter-modal facility.  HDR has taken a robust and comprehensive look at the area around the transit crossroads – looking at a variety of scales – and developed concepts for a transit hub on various sites, reflecting multi-modal transit development best practices. This is the culmination of an enormous amount of work, and is an exciting and thought provoking presentation. Click here to see the presentation.

Check out this great article written by William R. Morrish, Professor of Architecture, Landscape Architecture and Urban and Environmental Planning School of Architecture, University of Virginia. Morrish developed the article following his experiences working in post-Katrina New Orleans, post-9/11 Manhattan, and in response to the 1993 Mississippi River flood. He eloquently makes the case for:

• Re-thinking the role infrastructure plays in our private and collective lives
• Developing a comprehensive, integrated and collaborative approach to creating new forms of infrastructure that express and meet the new challenges of our society, economy and environment
• Incorporating natural systems and processes as structural components of sustainable infrastructure

Morrish’s article is especially noteworthy, as we move into a unique period of global warming, fluctuating fuel prices, limited natural resources and changing demographics—all of which require a new approach to development at a time of limited government resources.

Minneapolis has our own energy center – Hennepin Energy Recovery Center or HERC! HERC is an urban infrastructure hero dying for a make-over. Hennepin County and Covanta Energy, with the help of students from the University of Minnesota are planning this transformation. Click here to see why HERC is such a star and what her future holds.