Minneapolis has a displaced feeling today. People are talking about the bridge collapse, of course, but those conversations are often paralleled by open surprise that the collapse has become the focus of national and international attention (a friend emailed to say that it was featured on a local Shanghai newscast!). I guess that’s a function of the Scandinavian reserve that still characterizes Minnesota’s indigenous culture: one doesn’t show off successes, and one certainly hides one’s tragedies.
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As I mentioned in yesterday’s 35W post – I once lived two blocks from the bridge, with an unobstructed seventh floor view of the deck and the rush hour traffic that used to crowd it. One of the curious things about my old view – and about the late 35W bridge – is that neither offered a view of the river. This is partly a result of the fact that the Mississippi at St. Anthony Falls (the lock-and-dam that television images show just above the collapsed bridge) is narrow, lined by very steep banks. But I believe that it was also a deliberate outcome of the bridge’s design: even in the right-most lanes of the bridge, the rails were so high that it was mostly impossible to see the water.
In fact, my abiding memory of the view from the bridge was the spectacular panorama it offered of the Minneapolis skyline – minus the river. Which was always sort of appropriate: Minneapolis, more than St. Paul or any other Mississippi River city, has only the most tenuous connection to the river that runs through it (despite being founded to take advantage of the river’s currents). Real estate development, recreation, and even civic boosterism has never really taken advantage of the water feature. Thus, the sad, tragic irony of a river barely noticed now being a key feature in the most intensive international coverage that Minneapolis has received in years.