Behavioral Engineering in Downtown Minneapolis

When I was a teenager, downtown lured me with the hope of finding a fringed leather jacket at Dayton's or the perfect pair of shoes at Baker's and maybe lunch at Woolworth's counter or, if splurging, at Peter's Grill or The Haberdashery. For most of the years since then, downtown was a dying area with crime, grime, and expensive parking fees. The only thing that led me there was the occasional musical event or theatre production at one of the historic theatre houses on Hennepin Avenue, usually after dark.

We visited downtown last Thursday morning, hoping to discover its modern ambiance. 

We caught the light rail at its origin: the Mall of America which is only a few blocks from our house. The clean, new, air-conditioned rail cars stopped at 15 stops along the way and took in an interesting assortment of people at each stop. Almost everyone exited downtown. We walked along Nicollet Avenue, where car traffic is not allowed--only buses and taxis.

 Thursdays are farmer's market days during the summer, and, in the shadow of high-rise office buildings and department stores, the sidewalks were full of vendors selling their vegetables, fruit, and flowers. (Amish photo taken with permission.) The walks were also full of serenity-inducing modern art 

and intriguing local characters.

As the colors and smells and sounds drew us down the sidewalk, a sense of optimism started to build. A woman handed us a free banana and told us about a health demonstration just ahead.

Next to this educational demo was a rack of bright green bicycles that people can rent inexpensively for the day or as needed during the year to get around downtown and to get physical exercise.

  Good smells started to pump out of the restaurants along the street, and we ducked into Brit's Pub for some authentic English fish 'n chips. (We don't want freedom from all things British.) It was a warm day, so we elected to eat inside instead of at the Parisian-style sidewalk tables. Large signs at the restaurants told of advantages to customers if they eat after 5:00 p.m. (when downtown tends to empty out) and Orchestra Hall offered reinforcement of that behavior with the promise of free live music outdoors in the spacious, shady, tiered concrete Peavey Plaza just across the street. It made us want to stay later, but we decided to come back another day and enjoy downtown in the evening.