Data Centers the Latest To Save Downtown?

Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.

Downtown Is Back, Baby!

When Sleep Number’s downtown Minneapolis headquarters sold in 2019 for eight times the amount it was assessed at, local developers’ spidey senses began tingling. 

What made the site so attractive? The basement can be used as a mid-sized data center while the spaces above can still be rented out. And like a homeowner upgrading to marble countertops before a sale, Sleep Number had increased its data center wattage from two to 21 megawatts prior to hitting the market. "It's gotten everybody's attention," Don Kohlenberger, a local development consultant, tells Nick Halter for Axios Twin Cities. "It's a proof of concept."

But while these basement dwellers bring in a steady income for landlords, what do they do for us regular topsiders? Halter points out that data centers don’t generally create many jobs; a small or mid-sized facility only needs a dozen or so employees. Kohlenberger notes that this gives developers more confidence to convert the remaining spaces into commercial and residential real estate—but people still need to want to live downtown for the plan to ultimately work. And while downtown’s hearty power grid and infrastructure is attractive to data centers, it’s unclear how much multiple centers suddenly sucking up enough wattage to power 21,000 homes each would tax those systems.

In the meantime, the former Wells Fargo Operations Center on Washington Ave. is set for a similar expansion, and Halter notes that there has been talk of potentially turning the old Strib printing site (also once home to City Pages offices) into a big ol’ honking data center. 

The Boundary Waters Tops List of America’s Most Endangered Public Lands

Minnesotans love it when we top a national poll, but this is an exception: A new report ranks the Boundary Waters as the No. 1 endangered public land in 2026. RE:PUBLIC and Outside Magazine teamed up to create the top 10 list, interviewing a variety of experts including folks in wildland management, policy advisors, and conservationists. 

They believe the Boundary Waters’ biggest threat is Twin Metals, a Chilean-owned company dead set on mining the area for copper. But there are also Minnesota reps who value money over protecting one of the country’s most valuable natural assets.

“In January, the House of Representatives voted to overturn the Biden Administration’s 20-year moratorium on mining within 225,000 acres of the Superior National Forest, directly south of the Boundary Waters,” writes nature journalist Stephanie Pearson. “The resolution, introduced by Representative Pete Stauber (R-MN), used a novel interpretation of the Congressional Review Act to nullify the mining ban and prevent Congress from re-introducing another ban.” 

Copper mining is one of the most toxic processes out there; the Guardian recently described the dams used to contain chemical waste as “mining’s toxic time bomb.” 

Sack Now Even More Back

Back in 2022, Star Tribune editorial cartoonist Steve Sack thought his 42-year career had come to end after radiation treatment and carpal tunnel surgery left his right hand numb and unusable. But like a true artist he never stopped creating, picking up 3-D printing as a hobby and developing his left-hand skills via art classes, an iPad, and a few AI tools. 

Then Operation Metro Surge came to town. "Then this whole ICE thing started up, and I just got so fucking pissed off about it," he told Racket back in February. From there, Sack’s Substack, The Art of Sack, was born. 

But that’s not the only place you can see new work from the Pulitzer-winning cartoonist. MinnPost just announced that it will be publishing fresh Sack content every Thursday, starting with today’s timely commentary on rising gas costs. 

“What I do is a very simple thing,” he humbly tells Eric Ringham for MinnPost of his process. “I describe it as reading the paper, cracking a joke, drawing a picture and turning it in. That’s my job description.” But, as local readers have seen in recent years, getting the tone and message right really is no easy task, and it’s wonderful to see Sack hitting it out of the park again.

Lego Target Field!

Are you excited for the Twins’ 2026 season? Personally, I am excited for the team’s new foods media preview later this month. (Yes, we will be reviewing all the eats.) Perhaps even more exciting? Local Lego enthusiast Pat Brey has finished his epic rendering of Target Field after three years and 300-plus hours of work. The resulting replica is about 4-feet wide and 5-feet long. Brey says he hopes to display his creation at the stadium itself for Opening Day. He’s been documenting his efforts via TikTok, which you can watch here.