Linked below is the Medina Speed Study letter from the Hennepin County Transportation Department regarding the MnDOT study for County Road 116 between Highway 55 and Hackamore.

Traffic will be slowed down to 30 MPH about 300 feet north of Clydedale. While this isn’t a huge reduction, it does seem like it will slow traffic down somewhat.

Any questions about this report should be directed to Chad Adams, Medina City Administrator rather than to MnDOT or Hennepin County. Chad can be reached at 763-473-4643.

Medina Speed Study Letter

The New York Times published this article recently and it calls in to question something I’ve been thinking a lot about lately.

It has seemed to me that we have been in a period of rapid price declines in the past 6 months especially. Part of it is sellers finally getting serious and starting to drop their prices to get offers. But the other part has been the rapid increase in the price of gasoline and the uncertainty that has caused for Americans’ budgets.

If gas can be $4 per gallon which it is now, it’s not hard to believe that it could easily be $6 per gallon in the future. If we have a real oil shock, we could see $8-$10 per gallon. Now I’m of the mind that I believe gas is more likely to settle down to $2.50 – $3.00 per gallon but the American psyche has been damaged, and we will not soon forget the challenges high priced gas can bring.

And that brings me to real estate. Much of the boom that we have experienced since 2001 was predicated on extremely low gas prices, building materials and interest rates. The only thing that has remained relatively low of the three is interest rates and that’s only for the 30 year fixed. The prices on ARMs (Ajustable Rate Mortgages) has sky rocketed in the past 3 years. Much of the buying activity had been a result of ARMs.

So what is to happen to our outer ring suburbs or exurben communities? According to Mark Zandi, “the fuel price change should be capitalized into the cost of houses,” Mr. Zandi said. “Prices in the outer suburbs will get clobbered.”

For the Twin Cities, we are definitely seeing a lot of difficulty in our outer ring suburbs – note the Star Tribune story this spring on the troubles in Wright County. Like what’s mentioned in this story about the Denver exurb, we have many communities here in western Hennepin County that also likely to experience significant softness in pricing giving the distance away from Minneapolis.

All that said, I am not one that is saying it’s going to be a total wipe out and everyone is going to want to move in to the core cities. Too often articles like this on in the NY Times are used to push a political agenda. There are many, many people and institutions and political movements that stand to benefit from high gas prices. Don’t get your hopes up too soon that there’s going to be a quick fix to this problem.

I for one am not prepared to give up my country setting in a nice suburban neighborhood in order to join the “new urbanism.” Not when my option here is Minneapolis. I’m not interested in being a spectator to the crime issue there.