Welcome back to The Flyover, your daily digest of important, overlooked, and/or interesting Minnesota news stories.
Bring Back the Orbs!
Apologies if this is technically news from... three years ago. But, as Minneapolis officials advanced plans for the Upper Harbor Terminal project last month, one specific element of the new renderings shocked and disturbed our newsroom:
The 8,000-seat, First Avenue-operated amphitheater looks great, sure. Mayor Jacob Frey calling the Mississippi the “most epic river in the entire world” at last month's press event was painfully on-brand, yeah.
But where the hell are the giant concrete orbs that once occupied the North Side parcel? Previous renderings (see main photo) depicted them, in all their orb-y glory, overlooking the new park, amphitheater, health center, and mixed-income housing.
Wasting no time for things like "research" or "googling," I sent a panicked dispatch to the city's PR department. "Curious what happened to the orbs in the current renderings," I wrote. "All my cards on the table: The orbs looked cool!"
Here's what I heard back from city comms pro Jess Olstad...
The concrete storage domes were from the site’s use as a barge shipping terminal. They were on the future park property and were not part of the final park plan. The domes were studied for possible reuse. It was determined it was not feasible to reuse the domes for the future park space. Current park design reflects that. The domes were demolished in 2022, when the site was being prepared for the City’s street and utility project, and MPRB’s regional park construction. The City’s Heritage Preservation Commission approved the demolition application.
Sure enough, the dome demolition made headline news back in '22. Who knew?! (Don't answer.) As we stare down the barrel of an orbless future, feel free to relive the final moments of the Upper Harbor Terminal orbs, as captured by the neat drone footage below. The $350 million, 20-acre Upper Harbor Terminal redevelopment project is expected to be completed by 2027.
MAYOR WATCH: National Exposure for Fateh; More Candidates in St. Paul
DFL-endorsed Minneapolis mayoral candidate Omar Fateh received some major national exposure over the weekend.
First, the Wall Street Journal offered this perfunctory profile, in which he's referred to as "the so-called Mamdani of Minneapolis." (By whom? And also can we not?) Reporters Joshua Chaffin and Joe Barrett lay out the stakes you're already familiar with—moderates vs. socialists, youth energy vs. establishment status quo, etc. Former Mayor R.T. Rybak shows up to take a swipe and the meaningfulness of that DFL endorsement; Southwest Minnesota State University poli-sci prof David Sturrock pops in to say "In November, we’ll see." (Where'd this dude come from? He appeared, alongside a couple recent election losers, in this odd Strib story about whether Fateh is hurting rural Democrats.) Elsewhere, state Sen. Fateh guested on the popular progressive YouTube show/podcast Majority Report for, as far as I can tell, his first extended-length interview since his taco talk with Racket.
Did you know St. Paul also has a mayor's office, and its occupant will also be determined by voters this fall? (Calm down! We love ya St. Paul, even if our recent subscriber survey showed you're vastly outnumbered by Minneapolis readers.) State Rep. Kaohly Her (DFL-St. Paul) recently announced that she'll be challenging incumbent Melvin Carter, reports PiPresser Alex Derosier. Her, who was born inside a Laotian bamboo hut before coming to the U.S. as a refugee with her family, is joining an increasingly crowded field of challengers. There's "Yan Chen, a Democrat and biophysicist, and Mike Hilborn, a Republican business owner who runs a power-washing, Christmas tree lighting and snowplowing company," Derosier writes. Unlike the Minneapolis DFL, the St. Paul DFL decided against endorsing a candidate.
PiPress: Savannah Bananas Stealing St. Paul Saints Valor
My colleague Em Cassel tells me the Savannah Bananas are a big fuckin' deal; members of her softball team reportedly tried—and failed—to secure tickets to the wacky barnstorming attraction that trades in the baseball-adjacent sport known as Banana Ball. Having learned all of this, I'll extend a kudos to Dane Mizutani of the Pioneer Press for his provincial "well, actually" column after the Bananas played back-to-back games Saturday at St. Paul's CHS Field.
"The St. Paul Saints walked so the Savannah Bananas could run," he writes, referencing our local club's pioneering gimmickry from the '90s: naming a ball pig, staging the world’s largest pillow fight, bringing aboard Bill Murray as a minority owner. "It’s a similar vibe from the Savannah Bananas nearly 30 years later. Only they have taken it to the next level. Think the St. Paul Saints on steroids," Mizutani concludes in a mostly glowing review of the Savannah Bananas antics.
Since 2021, the Saints have starched their collars a bit, the reality of being a AAA affiliate to the Twins. But, as owner Mike Veeck sensed in 1993 with the upstart Saints, dumb fun and baseball go together like (lord forgive me for the hack completion of this sentence...) peanuts and Cracker Jack. Take the baton and run, Bananas.
BWCA Under Threat, Yet Again
Bad news dropped Friday for lovers of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness. A recent U.S. House environmental appropriations bill would reinstate two important leases for Twin Metals, a Chilean company that hopes to mine near the pristine BWCA, and also financially defang a 20-year hard-rock mining moratorium on 225,000 acres of the Superior National Forest.
Department of Interior Deputy Secretary Kate McGregor wrote on Twitter that the Trump administration, "is withdrawing the Biden administration’s misinterpretation of the law that was used to cancel leases at the Twin Metals mine. This important first step will unlock significant quantities of important platinum-group metals vital to meeting Energy Dominance goals of [Trump.]" She followed that up with a series of emojis because we live in hell.
U.S. Rep. Pete Stauber (R-MN) belched out the following to the Duluth News Tribune's Jimmy Lovrien: “After Republicans took back the White House and Congress this past fall, I have maintained that all options are on the table to restore key leases and reverse the Biden administration’s harmful, politically motivated, and illegal mineral withdrawal in the Superior National Forest. I will pursue every avenue available to get this done quickly and decisively.”
Crucially, the U.S. House language related to Twin Metals isn't present in the Senate version of the bill. But Chris Knopf with Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness tells Lovrien that he's “very concerned” the appropriations bill wording could become law.
