Mark your calendars for July 30 and join in the statewide celebration of Mn/DOT's 25th anniversary.

Bay City Rollers, Diana Ross and Barry Manilow were at the top of their game in 1976, but could they hold a note to Mn/DOT’s best and loudest today?

You be the judge—or better yet, a participant—on July 30 when Mn/DOT statewide celebrates its 25th anniversary. Special activities marking the event will be held throughout the state, including a sing-along of the department’s “Moving Minnesota” theme song written by former Mn/DOT employee Tom Broadbent.  

In addition, various events—such as a 1970s fashion show, Mn/DOT trivia contest, open mike reminisces—are being planned in the districts and Central Office. Every employee also will receive a Moving Minnesota t-shirt.

For more information, contact your district’s public affairs coordinator or visit the 25th anniversary Web site. The site will be updated as information becomes available.

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Dave Jennings, chair of the Legislature’s Major Projects Commission, urged a $500 million increase in transportation funding at a commission meeting July 17.

Jennings, president of the Greater Minneapolis Chamber of Commerce, said the commission needs to find ways to accelerate completion of major projects, primarily those costing more than $5 million.

The Legislature created the commission in 2000 to review Mn/DOT’s multi-million dollar projects (those that are more than 25 percent of a district's annual construction budget), cut those it considers unneeded and rank projects to the governor and the Legislature.

Former Speaker of the Minnesota House of Representatives, Jennings said new funding sources—such as an increase in the motor fuel tax, a sales tax on motor fuels, a dedicated motor vehicle sales tax or a combination of them—are needed to prevent the worsening of traffic congestion and other transportation problems.

Jennings received support from fellow commission member, Sen. Dean Johnson, DFL-Willmar, who said the commission needs to promote an aggressive funding package next year.

Scott Peterson, assistant to the deputy commissioner, said Mn/DOT welcomes the support from the commission.

"We're pleased that the commission is taking an active role in identifying solutions to our growing transportation problems—related both to funding and other barriers to completion of major projects throughout Minnesota,” he said.

For more information, visit the Major Projects Commission Web site; see also the May 16 article in Mn/DOT Newsline.

By Craig Wilkins

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Staff members from the Office of Aeronautics set up shop today on the tarmac at the Oshkosh, Wis. airport, to promote tourism and flying in Minnesota at Airventure 2001, the nation’s largest air show.

The annual event sponsored by the Experimental Aircraft Association draws more than 10,000 aircraft and hundreds of thousands of aviation enthusiasts. During the weeklong show, the airport becomes the world’s busiest, with aircraft landing as often as 10 seconds apart.

Fact sheets, highway maps and other materials will be available to visitors to the Aeronautics booth, said Dan McDowell, Aeronautics. Copies of the state’s aeronautical chart and the Minnesota airport directory will be available for pilots.

“Our booth at Oshkosh provides visibility for aviation in Minnesota and encourages people to fly into Minnesota for recreation as well as business,” McDowell said.

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Mary Nelsestuen, State Bicycle Advisory Committee member, checks in a customer at the free bike parking location during the Taste of Minnesota event at the Capitol in early July.

The number of riders using the free bike parking service at this year’s Taste of Minnesota increased by 49 percent over last year, reports Bob Works, Environmental Services.

More than 520 bicycles this year were corralled inside the parking ramp adjacent to the Centennial Office Building on the Capitol grounds, he said. Bike parkers came from more than 70 different Twin Cities communities.

Mn/DOT, the Department of Administration and the State Bicycle Advisory Committee co-sponsored this service, now in its second year. Forty volunteers from various bicycle groups and associations staffed the parking facility over the course of the event, which ran June 30 through July 4.

For more information or to volunteer next year, call 651/297-1664. 

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Question:  Where do the various bridges around the metro, like “Dartmouth” and the “Wakota” get their names? Can you provide a list of all the named bridges (and tunnels) and where they are in the metro area?

Answer:  Most of the Twin Cities metro area bridges carry the name of:

§         The street they are on (Wabasha Bridge or Robert St. Bridge over the Mississippi River in downtown St. Paul); or

§         A street that they cross over (Dartmouth Bridge; Cayuga Bridge).

Some bridges carry the name of a nearby geographical feature, such as:

§         The cities they are in or near (Anoka-Champlin River Bridge carries Hwy 169 over the Mississippi to connect Anoka and Champlin; the Hudson Bridge carries I-94 over the St. Croix River to Hudson, Wisconsin);

§         A nearby landmark (the Fort Snelling Tunnel, the History Center Tunnel in St. Paul, and the Bloomington Ferry Bridge); or

§         A geographic feature (Lowry Hill Tunnel carries I-94 through Lowry Hill on the edge of downtown Minneapolis).

§         The Wakota Bridge, the I-494 bridge over the Mississippi River, has a less obvious geographic connection: it links Washington County and Dakota County.

Two other bridges wear names that describe their physical appearance: the Stone Arch Bridge over the Mississippi River in Minneapolis and the High Bridge over the Mississippi River in St. Paul.

Less obvious bridge names identify dedicated or memorial bridges. These names required legislative approval:

§         Braun/Richard P. Braun Bridge
Hwy 610 over the Mississippi River between Coon Rapids and Brooklyn Park. Named after former Mn/DOT Commissioner Richard Braun.

§         F. W. Cappelen Memorial Bridge
Franklin Avenue over the Mississippi River between Minneapolis and St. Paul. It’s better known as the Franklin Avenue Bridge.

§         Kline Memorial Bridge
Main Street over the Rum River in Anoka.

§         Old Soldiers Home Bridge
Soldiers Road over Minnehaha Creek in Minneapolis near the Veterans Home and the Veterans Hospital.

§         Irene Hixon Whitney Bridge
The pedestrian bridge over Hennepin Avenue, I-94, and Lyndale Avenue in Minneapolis. This bridge connects Loring Park with the Walker Sculpture Garden (think of the big Cherry Spoon sculpture). It’s named for the late wife of Wheelock Whitney, a Minneapolis businessman.

Some bridges carry more than one name. The Cappelen Memorial Bridge is better known as the Franklin Avenue Bridge. The Lowry Tunnel is also the Hennepin-Lyndale Tunnel.

To further confuse things, one name serves two completely different bridges in different parts of the metro area.

§         One Cedar Avenue Bridge is in Minneapolis;

§         The other Cedar Avenue Bridge connects Bloomington and Eagan.

The former structure carries I-94 over Cedar Avenue. The latter is on Cedar Avenue/Hwy 36 and crosses the Minnesota River.

For a complete list of bridge names and locations in Minnesota, including the metro area, contact Charles Deutsch in Bridges and Structures at 651/747-2121.

Addendum: One reader asked about the longest stretches of “crooked road” and “straight road” in Minnesota. Charles DeLisi reports that Mn/DOT does not track these statistics. We’ve asked Jerry Baldwin in the Mn/DOT library to see if anyone else does. Stay tuned.

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