Mills District, Minneapolis
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Mills District is a neighborhood within Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States, and a part of the larger Downtown East neighborhood. Its approximate boundaries are the Mississippi River to the north, 11th Avenue to the east, Washington Avenue to the south, and 5th Avenue to the west. It is bounded by Downtown West as well as the rest of the Downtown East neighborhoods. The Marcy-Holmes neighborhood is on the other side of the river, but there is no direct automobile connection between the two neighborhoods. There is a pedestrian and bicycle connection via the Stone Arch Bridge.
The neighborhood contains a number of former flour mills left over from the days when Minneapolis was the flour milling capital of the world; a number of these have been converted into condominiums.[1] The area also includes several cultural institutions, including the Guthrie Theater, the Mill City Museum as well as the soon-to-be-finished home of the MacPhail Center for Music.[2] The area includes the Mill Ruins Park as well as the new Gold Medal Park. It contains the headquarters for the McKnight Foundation as well as Walden University.
[edit] History
- See also: History of Minneapolis, Minnesota
The Mill District was once a part of the greater flour milling industry tied around the Saint Anthony Falls and the power it provided. With mills stretching from the current Mill District to the other side of the Mississippi to Nicollet Island, Minneapolis became the flour milling capital of the world. These mills prospered from the late-1800s to the 1930s when fossil fuels replaced water power throughout the industry. As a result, many of the old mills in the district were vacated. The rail lines that had fed the mills were removed and turned into parking lots for the nearby Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome. At one point, a new Twins Ballpark was proposed for the Mississippi riverfront site east of the Guthrie Theater, and land was cleared; however, once the final location moved to the Warehouse District, the area was converted into Gold Medal Park.
In 1998, the City of Minneapolis enacted a Historic Mills District Master Plan, revised in 2000, to encourage development along the long-neglected stretch of riverfront. As a result, historic buildings were converted for adaptive reuse, bringing a residential population to a neighborhood that beforehand didn't have many residents. The neighborhood gained the Mill City Museum, built around the fortified ruins of the Washburn "A" Mill, in 2003 and the Guthrie Theater complex, which abandoned its old location near Loring Park during the summer of 2006. The MacPhail Center for Music elected to build its new campus in the neighborhood, to be finished in 2007. The Mill City Farmers Market, an organic farmers market, was begun in 2006.
[edit] References
- ^ Linda Mack, Around the Guthrie: Designing a district, Star Tribune, May 16, 2007.
- ^ David Brauer, MacPhail Center for Music unveils Mill District home, Downtown Journal, Accessed May 17, 2007.
[edit] External links
- Mills District, Minneapolis is at coordinates Coordinates:
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