Star Tribune
Slush and crashes make for slow going on Twin Cities highways after snowstorm
The worst of the weekend storm is over, but commuters across the metro on Monday morning are still feeling the effects as mainline roads remain wet and slushy with slick spots and neighborhood streets are covered with snow.
By 1 a.m., snow totals at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport totaled 8.2 inches where just a few outbound flights had been canceled or delayed as of early Monday, according to Flightaware.com. On Sunday, hundreds were scrapped or delayed. The airport snowfall marked a new March 24 record.
Other metro area totals included 8.1 inches in Chanhassen, 7.5 inches in Minnetonka and Woodbury, 7 inches in northeast Minneapolis, 6.1 inches in Falcon Heights and 5.6 inches in Brooklyn Park. The most snow fell in Hugo, where 9.1 inches were reported, according to the National Weather Service.
A vehicle flipped over on its side on southbound I-94 near the Lowry Hill Tunnel, one of several wrecks on Twin Cities freeways as the rush hour got underway, a sign the early drive to work would be a messy one. The Anoka-Hennepin School District canceled classes, as did St. Cloud and other school systems.
A winter storm warning remained in effect on Monday for the remainder of the state except for the Twin Cities and southern and southeastern Minnesota, where snow had begun to transition over to rain as temperatures rise above the freezing mark.
But it was enough snow to make travel tricky and Minnesota Department of Transportation plows busy. Crews also may get a helping hand from the rain and warmer conditions helping to melt the snow.
“The rain is helping to see a quick turnaround on the roads,” said MnDOT spokeswoman Anne Meyer. But drivers should not let their guard down as scattered slick spots remained, she warned. “It doesn’t take much to create an issue.”
Some suburbs declared snow emergencies, including Plymouth, Brooklyn Park and Richfield. Neither Minneapolis nor St. Paul had called one as of 5:45 a.m. Monday.
The recovery process may be slower north of the Twin Cities where snow was continuing Monday morning and roads remain snow and ice covered. Meyer said MnDOT plows would remain on the job all day.
“We are not done yet,” she said.
After rain on Monday, another round of snow and perhaps freezing rain is expected to move into the metro area on Tuesday before the sun returns on Wednesday. By the weekend, temperatures are expected to be in the 40s.
ROCHESTER – Buoyed by strong growth in the health care industry, Minnesota’s third-largest city continues to outpace the rest of the state in job creation.
The Rochester Metropolitan Statistical Area added about 7,000 jobs over the past year, a 6.3% year-to-year increase, according to the September jobs report from the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED). By comparison, Minnesota as a whole was up 1.2% during the same time period. The next closest region to Rochester was Mankato, which grew 1.6% year to year.
Much of the growth in Rochester MSA, which includes Dodge, Fillmore, Olmsted and Wabasha counties, was driven by a 15% year-to-year increase in the education and health services sector. The sector employed 62,435 people in the region in September, nearly half the overall workforce.
The strong job numbers come as Mayo Clinic breaks ground on the first phases of “Bold. Forward. Unbound. In Rochester.” The $5 billion project — the largest investment in Minnesota history — is expected to bring about 2,000 construction workers to Rochester in the coming years.
While Mayo has not said how many employees it plans to hire once the new facilities open, local economic development officials expect the impacts of the expansion to reverberate across the region.
“As their growth goes up, the rest of the economy grows as well,” said John Wade, president of the Rochester Area Economic Development, Inc. (RAEDI). “If you think about neighboring communities, too, there will be more housing opportunities and job opportunities and businesses looking to expand.”
Wade said he also sees potential for growth in other sectors tied to Mayo, such as hospitality, which makes up more than 8% of the region’s workforce. Precision manufacturing and medical technology were also identified as potential growth sectors.
While the newest shark at the Minnesota Zoo might be particularly skilled at swimming, she was named after St. Paul’s beloved Olympic gymnast, the zoo announced Thursday.
Suni the zebra shark was born Aug. 17, just after the conclusion of the summer Olympics in Paris, where gymnast Suni Lee earned three medals.
Zoo visitors will be able to spot the striped baby Suni in the shark nursery in Discovery Bay, according to the zoo’s weekly newsletter. Those stripes won’t last forever; by the time she’s one, Suni’s stripes will be replaced with spots.
Visitors may find Suni exploring her environment or lying still, which is normal. Zebra sharks can rest motionless on the bottom and use throat muscles to pump water across their gills.
Zebra sharks are an endangered species, over-hunted for their fins, according to the zoo. The zoo is part of a global program that sends eggs and pups from zoos and aquariums to Indonesia to be released into the wild.
Suni’s mom is Ruby the shark, the zoo’s only breeding female. Ruby is also the mother of 7-year-old female JZ. Mother sharks do not raise their young, unlike many aquatic mammals like dolphins.
Ruby is a genetic match for the shark rehabilitation program and the zoo hopes to provide viable eggs in the future.
We at the Minnesota Star Tribune are committed to continually enhancing our digital products and experience. Earlier this year, we rebooted and upgraded the Minnesota Star Tribune’s website and apps to create a cleaner, crisper, modern platform that we’ll continue to build upon. And today, we’re reaching out to let you know about another upcoming enhancement that will impact anyone who visits startribune.com or our mobile apps.
Starting Friday, Oct. 25, we are making changes to our login and subscription management system. These changes will require you to log back into your Minnesota Star Tribune account on startribune.com and to our apps when login goes live there early next week. We’re sorry for the small inconvenience – but it will be worth it.
Why are we doing this? We are moving subscription management for our digital subscribers to a modern subscription management platform. This platform will level up your subscription management experience, allowing us to serve you in ways that were not possible with our legacy system.
Enhancements you will notice include a modern payment infrastructure and subscription management, including the ability to easily make changes to your subscription right in the platform. You will also see a simplified login flow using your email address (no need to remember a separate username).
If you are a subscriber, or if you have logged into the site over the past two years, you should have already received communication about this via email, and we encourage you read those communications to ensure you are prepared for this change. In addition, you will see messaging on our website and apps notifying you of this coming change.
If you encounter any issues, you can find more information about our updates here.
In addition, we will be rolling out new ways to log in to your account, starting with Google, on Friday.
This upgrade also lays the foundation for greater personalization and content customization for a more robust digital experience in the future.
