Star Tribune
What’s going on at Southtown in Bloomington? Demolition has started for possible redevelopment.
Wrecking equipment began to tear into the Herberger’s and Toys ‘R’ Us buildings in Bloomington on Tuesday. The two buildings have been vacant for more than five years in the Southtown Shopping Center.
A spokesperson for Kraus Anderson, the development company that owns the mall, said there are not solid plans yet for replacements. Kraus Anderson and the city of Bloomington have been trying to revamp the property for almost a decade.
The company had the city of Bloomington declare the two vacant stores “structurally substandard” in October, a designation that opens the door for tax incentives from the city for redevelopment.
Bloomington Port Authority Assistant Administrator Jason Schmidt said in October that the incentives could help push the kind of pedestrian-friendly redevelopment the city has hoped for along Penn Avenue and the Orange Line bus rapid transit route.
Kraus-Anderson touted the mall’s high occupancy rates after the 2008 recession. But more recently, major tenants have disappeared as big-box retail chains have gone out of business. The Herberger’s building has been vacant since the department store chain shut down in 2018, and the Toys “R” Us store was emptied in 2015. Bed Bath and Beyond closed its Southtown store earlier this year.
In 2014, the city and Kraus-Anderson clashed on a proposal to rezone Southtown to push smaller-scale shops and apartments.
Then in 2021, Kraus-Anderson proposed a Hy-Vee grocery store and liquor store, with the possibility of building high-rise office and apartment buildings around the shops, but withdrew the proposal a few months later.
Transforming the heart of both downtowns, which have much larger buildings than old warehouses, is going to take a lot more money, creativity and time. Josh Talberg, managing director at downtown Minneapolis brokerage JLL, said with no major apartment buildings on the drawing board in either downtown, the fleet of empty office buildings present a golden opportunity to create more housing and lead both cities in a new direction.
“You can can certainly see the fundamentals improving, and you can feel that vibrancy, and that’s ultimately the foundation that’s needed to get investors to reinvest in the city,” he said. “But it’s not as if these 18-wheelers can turn on a dime.”
The Minnesota Department of Transportation closed part of a state highway Wednesday evening near Austin because of a “major hazardous materials release” in the area.
Hwy. 56 from Hayfield to Waltham, a stretch covering about five miles, was closed in both directions and drivers were directed to follow a detour to Blooming Prairie on U.S. Hwy. 218.
No information on the hazardous materials released was immediately available.
A federal judge dismissed a civil lawsuit against Minnesota state trooper Ryan Londregan in the shooting death of Ricky Cobb II during a 2023 traffic stop.
The decision is the latest development in a case that has drawn heated debate over excessive use of force by law enforcement. Criminal charges against Londregan were dismissed by Hennepin County Attorney Mary Moriarty in June, saying the prosecution didn’t have the evidence to proceed with a case.
On Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Nancy E. Brasel granted Londregan’s motion to dismiss the civil suit, arguing he acted reasonably when he opened fire as Cobb’s vehicle lurched forward with another state trooper partly inside.
Londregan’s attorney Chris Madelsaid Wednesday that it’s been a “long, grueling journey to justice. Ryan Londregan has finally arrived.”
On July 31, 2023, the two troopers pulled over Cobb, 33, on Interstate 94 in north Minneapolis for driving without taillights and later learned he was wanted for violating a felony domestic no-contact order. Cobb refused commands to exit the car.
With Seide partly inside the car while trying to unbuckle Cobb’s seatbelt, the car moved forward. Londregan then opened fire, hitting Cobb twice.
In her decision, Brasel said the troopers were mandated by state law to make an arrest given Cobb’s domestic no-contact order violation. She said it was objectively reasonable for Londregan to believe Seide was in immediate danger as the car moved forward on a busy highway, which would make his use of force reasonable.
