rogress P 4
5
8
9
agriculture & industry • community • faith & charities Education • down through the years • family & home business & health • life • neighbors • people A PUBLICATION OF THE ALBERT LEA TRIBUNE • FEBRUARY 2014
Sue McCormick, center, and Carol Busch talk Feb. 12 inside Prairie Wind Coffee on Broadway. Sarah Stultz
Let’s go downtown!
Broadway is changing in more ways than just new pavement By Sarah Stultz
sarah.stultz@albertleatribune.com
A
lbert Lean Linda Knudsen has fond memories of the city’s downtown. With everything from Herberger’s and Leuthold’s to other retail stores like Woolworth’s, it was often a community gathering place, she said. “It was loaded,” Knudsen said. “We had lots of clothing stores; there were drug stores and there were tons of people.” Knudsen, who now owns Plymouth Shoes with her husband on Broadway, said she hopes someday the downtown can get back to that. “It’s all about bringing the community here to see what we have to offer,” she said. Several community leaders say the city is taking steps in that direction with the reconstruction of Broadway last summer, the implementation of new events downtown and renovations of several downtown buildings. Having a local coffee shop and swanky bar and grill open up in the past two years hasn’t hurt for getting people downtown, either. “We’ve been very pleased with the private and civic support of the downtown,” said Albert Lea City Manager Chad Adams. “We just hope it continues to be a domino effect. That’s part of the intent is to get more density in the downtown.”
Broadway reconstruction City leaders and residents celebrated the $4.6 million downtown reconstruction in October with a 5-kilometer Color Dash, games, food, dancing and music. Crews replaced aging water and sewer infrastructure under the road, put in new roadways and sidewalks and installed bumpouts that shorten the distance to cross streets. Downtown Albert Lea is more pedestrian-friendly than before. Large flower pots now adorn the sidewalks, along with benches and new street lights. Restaurants will be able to have seating and tables outdoors next to their businesses. Susie Petersen, executive
director of the Albert Lea Convention and Visitors Bureau, said once spring arrives and the snow is melted, downtown business owners and volunteers plan to plant flowers in all of the pots on the ground plus install hanging plants on the light poles. “It will be a great transformation,” Petersen said. “We already get people when they come in, they say, ‘You have a beautiful town,’ I’m just excited about it.” Prairie Wind Coffee owner Lisa Hanson said she has enjoyed seeing the improvements downtown. “It has dressed it up,” Hanson said. In the spring, crews will complete the reconstruction of Fountain Lake Park, and once that is done there will be another celebration planned by the city’s Parks and Recreation Department. The project is expected to continue south down Broadway in 2015. Adams said the state is planning a mill and overlay of Broadway south of Main Street. The city hopes to have some of the same design features — street lights, benches and decorative pavers — put in there as there have been on Broadway north of Main Street. Adams said though he knows the reconstruction will not revitalize the downtown overnight, it can, together with collaboration from other groups, point the city in the right direction.
Downtown events In 2012, the downtown debuted its summer market and music festival called Wind Down Wednesday with the goal of bringing people to the heart of the city. Designed after a weekly festival in Rochester called Thursdays on First, it was moved to Central Park in 2013 because of the construction. It is slated to return to Broadway this year. It will be once a month in June, July and August and features vendors, food, entertainment and other activities. “We wanted to do more for 4Downtown, Page 8
Photo courtesy Freeborn County Historical Museum
The intersection of Broadway and Main Street in Albert Lea might never be as busy as shown in this undated photograph, which looks to be before the freeways were built. However, the downtown in the past two years has gone through changes that have spurred increased interest. On some evenings this winter, cars are parked up and down the northern three blocks of the four-block stretch of Broadway north of Main. Sometimes, they fill the North Broadway parking lot, too. That rarely happened at night as recently as three years ago. There is momentum in the downtown’s favor now, and it’s not merely a new street.
Sarah Stultz
A woman walks down Broadway on a cold afternoon in February past the new 112 on Broadway. Spring will allow many Albert Leans to see the upgraded downtown in all its newness without snow and winter grime.