Blog
Changemakers in action… read all about it:
Finance & Commerce: Grants drive development along Twin Cities transit arteries
May 2, 2012
By Nancy Crotti Met Council awards $15.4M to 17 projects The dream of a walkable, arts-centered cultural district with a mix of housing, retail and commercial uses in Minneapolis’ Prospect Park is one step closer to fruition. The Metropolitan Council on Wednesday awarded the city of Minneapolis a grant of $2.7 million to jump-start the [...]
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Don’t forget Building User Experience (when Designing for Sustainability)
April 2, 2012
With reducing energy consumption being a top priority for responsible developers, it can be difficult to evaluate other important qualities of a product without conducting your own testing (which is an option too; I still have a water-saving shower head in my shower that I was testing for a development 3 years ago). But, most [...]
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The State of Solar Energy
March 2, 2012
Solar PV (photovoltaic) electricity is rapidly becoming a more affordable option for buildings’ and communities’ clean energy needs. Scalable in that it can be used anywhere from small houses to large-scale power plants, solar PV now employs over 100,000 Americans, more than the coal industry. In fact, solar power creates the most jobs per megawatt [...]
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What do artists and developers have in common?
February 10, 2012
How can we get real estate developers, city officials, planners, architects, and artists to all come together in the same room? This is an idea Colleen Carey has been pondering for years. Carey organizes a networking / think-tank group called GeoEcoLab to bring together various stakeholders in the development industry to work towards community redevelopment [...]
» Read moreFinance & Commerce: $3 million sale of former Lyndale Garden Center closes
December 12, 2011
From: Finance & Commerce By: Anne Bretts The Richfield-based Cornerstone Group closed Nov. 21 on the $3 million site acquisition of the former Lyndale Garden Center at 6400 Lyndale Ave. S. in Richfield. Developer Colleen Carey of Cornerstone has unveiled the details of her plan to work with local artists and the community to design [...]
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The Cornerstone Group Completes Acquisition of Lyndale Garden Center
November 21, 2011
The Cornerstone Group is now one step closer to creating its vision of a great town center for Richfield at the former Lyndale Garden Center site. With assistance from the City of Richfield, Hennepin County, the Metropolitan Council, Local Initiatives Support Corporation, and the Family Housing Fund, TCG has purchased the site at 6400 Lyndale [...]
» Read moreFinance & Commerce: Developer Set to Buy Lyndale Garden Center
November 17, 2011
From: Finance & Commerce By: Burl Gilyard Developer Colleen Carey of the Richfield-based Cornerstone Group is preparing to buy the former Lyndale Garden Center for a mixed-use redevelopment. The site at 6400 Lyndale Ave. S. in Richfield has been vacant for five years. “We are closing on Monday,” Carey said. “We’re really excited about the [...]
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Net-Zero Energy: The Future of Sustainable Buildings
November 15, 2011
With so many buildings LEED certified, you may be asking yourself, where does this all lead to (no pun intended)? The next wave of green buildings will be the tipping point for sustainability in our cities, the culmination of years of integrating smaller sustainability measures and now envisioning a holistic system for an entire site [...]
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Green Building Report Released
November 10, 2011
On Tuesday, Greenbiz.com released its “The State and Impacts of Green Buildings” report, with encouraging results for the green building industry. Rob Watson, Senior Contributor for Greenbiz.com emphasizes that “green value is becoming statistically significant. If you’re not making money with a green building, you need a new marketing department. If your green building is [...]
» Read moreLyndale Garden Center project featured on University of St. Thomas site
November 2, 2011
This post, A Fresh Vision for Richfield: Redeveloping the Lyndale Garden Center Site, was featured on the University of St. Thomas Real Estate Matters Blog. When it comes to development, Colleen Carey, President of The Cornerstone Group, doesn’t believe in just razing one property to replace it with a run-of-the-mill mixed use concept. Rather, her [...]
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TCG 2010 Reflections
February 17, 2011
The TCG team shares its reflections from a jam-packed year in 2010 and celebrates the promise of new opportunities in 2011.
» Read moreDreaming of a (bigger) urban home
February 14, 2011
I love where I live. My house is ½ a block from our neighborhood elementary school, walking distance to the hardware store, drycleaner, restaurants, coffee shops and a handful of other retailers. We are 2 blocks from Minehaha Creek and a quick one mile bike ride to Lake Harriet. We love our neighbors and have regular neighborhood get-togethers. There are 26 kids on our block alone and they all play nicely together. So why is it that I am constantly on the look-out for a new house?
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In Copenhagen, they’re still biking…
January 26, 2011
As a fair weather bicycle commuter, I put my bike away this year on November 8th but I feel a little bit wimpy about it when I see these Danes continuing to put the miles on their bikes through LOTS of snow and ice. Read more
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From Motown to Growtown, to Frogtown
December 15, 2010
Another example of urban pioneers making a difference in the transformation of a decapitating American city.
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The New Places You’ll Go
December 13, 2010
Orton Family Foundation blog contributor, Anna Jones shares some nice thoughts about walkability and placemaking.
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Managing waste in an affordable community
December 9, 2010
How collaboration is fueling a massive cleanup effort in affordable communities around the world.
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Top Five Projects
December 8, 2010
A list of the EPA’s five winning projects around the country.
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FALLowup Rooftop Farming- Revisited
November 22, 2010
Simple Good and Tasty pays us another visit.
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“Rooftop to Tabletop: Urban Farming Spreads Roots”
November 10, 2010
NRDC’s Onearth magazine discusses rooftop farming and “The Year of Urban Agriculture.”
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Question: Why are we so relaxed?
November 10, 2010
The Twin Cities is ranked No. 1 most relaxing city in America. We ask why?
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Apple gets into TOD-Like!
November 8, 2010
Check out Lincoln Park’s newly-renovated subway station. It kind of makes us think about our TOD thought process in a bit of a different way. The high prices for land and property, along with the ubiquitous uncertainty about the direction of our cities; repositioning dilapidated, underutilized properties in great neighborhoods to serve transit seems like [...]
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What Good is A Stroller?
October 1, 2010
Ian Sacs, a transportation engineer based in New York City shares his youthful perspective (something we get our fair share of) with Planetizen.
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Geo Eco Slumdog?
September 13, 2010
Another take on The Geo Eco Lab, how some of the world’s leading architects and designers are rethinking the development model for the swag city of the future.
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Detroit Has The Answers
September 13, 2010
Palladium teams up with creatives from Virtue and Johnny Knoxville of MTV’s Jackass to do some real urban exploration in Detroit. They find some very intriguing stuff.
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Taking the Carbon Economy to The White House
September 10, 2010
Things are looking sunny at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Bill McKibben talks about the low carbon economy with Dave Letterman.
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Jay Walking
September 7, 2010
We like to jaywalk, but we also like to follow the rules. Korean designer, Jae Min Lim shows us a way that we might be able to bring jaywalking to the masses
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How Public Transportation is Healthful
September 6, 2010
Although it isn’t the most convenient, nor most comfortable, PSFK writes a piece of the health benefits of public transportation.
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Linked Hybrid
August 27, 2010
Steven Holl Architects helps identify new parts to the future of the mixed-use equation
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Lets Walk The Walk, Shouldn’t We?
August 27, 2010
Kaid Bedfield and David Roberts share their $.02 on issues with walkability and street connectivity.
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The “New, New Urbanism”
July 29, 2010
Recently, our innovation squadron has been focusing energy toward the future health and vitality of our cities. We see this as an attempt to solve global problems at local levels. This work has allowed us to make a foray into urban agriculture, creating Minnesota’s first rooftop farming company, Cornerstone Rooftop Farms. Our first farm, located [...]
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Greensgrow Market
July 26, 2010
We need to start looking at our cities and how we go about using land and collaborating with owners and users alike in order to take sustainability to a real, meaningful level.
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Which Came First, The City or The Farm?
July 26, 2010
Grist.org writes an exceptional piece that ties back to a conversation that we had a few years ago. Here at TCGMN, we’ve always had a policy against corn field development, but have we turned the tables on ourselves? We have spent the past year and a half installing urban farms at our developments, edible landscaping [...]
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New Retail- On the Inside: one
July 14, 2010
Always thinking, and rethinking; lets start to take a look at retail. 1st stop, Barca.
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Vanity Fair’s ‘World Architecture Survey’
July 2, 2010
Vanity Fair’s list of best architecture since 1980
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What Wash Is Your Insulation?
July 2, 2010
How we aren’t using old jeans to insulate our existing buildings, but Levi’s is.
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Not P Diddy’s ‘White Party’
July 2, 2010
Turning to white roofs when you can’t install a farm. Akomplice, out of Colorado teams up with Fred Segal and The Paint Project to save the world.
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Open House, Anybody?
June 28, 2010
Pedal To Properies is one of the nation’s first bike-based residential brokerages. Looks like quite a concept!
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BYOB–to a wedding??
June 14, 2010
Not-so-traditional wedding bells ring in Tucson, AZ. A bike wedding is underway.
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A Little ‘Around The World’ with The Arts
June 14, 2010
Exploring the arts community with our friend Janaina Tschape
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Bombs Away!
June 14, 2010
Greenaid’s seed bomb gumball machines are beginning to pop up all over The West Coast. Not long before we start seeing them in our new urban ag plan here in MSP!
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Never Too Early For A Sukkah
June 4, 2010
Raising the bar once again. This time, Reboot and The Union Square Partnership travel through time, organizing an urban Sukkah design competition.
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Turning Freeways Into Parks
May 11, 2010
Efforts to convert existing freeways for parks and public open spaces.
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Simple Good and Tasty on Cornerstone Rooftop Farms
May 10, 2010
Our friends at Simple Good and Tasty wrote a great piece that covers a lot of ‘ground’ on “Kensington”, Minnesota’s first rooftop farm. Be sure to check out their Huffington Post article too!
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Minneapolis Named #1 Most Bike Friendly City
May 6, 2010
Although Minneapolis is a frozen tundra often as early as November… Bicycling Magazine, calls “Minneapolis, the number 1 most bike friendly city.”
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Affordability Index
May 6, 2010
New Urban News discusses the new Housing and Transportation Affordability Index and we this it is essential for use in all of our cities.
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Changing the Colour
April 26, 2010
Revitalizing our built environments, one community at a time.
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Sherwin Williams Color Sn’app’
April 26, 2010
The newest way to select a paint palette. The iPhone + iPod Touch app for Sherwin Williams
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Farm to Table, to Phone
April 25, 2010
How our digital lifestyles and our eating habits have collided. Taking pictures of almost everything we eat.
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Jeffrey Barg on Trains and Tom Waits
April 25, 2010
We are all following the 2010 Transportation Bill and are mostly eager to get our kicks off of ‘Route 66′ and on the super high tech, super high speed rail of the (hopefully) near future. “But if the classic American narrative is all about trains, why are we so far behind in building high-speed rail? [...]
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Rivertown Commons and Farming in Frogtown
April 25, 2010
As you may know, our company, Cornerstone Rooftop Farms is beginning to operate its first farm called Kensington, a small, modular farm in South Minneapolis. What you may not know is that we are also working with Backyard Harvest on food access initiatives at our Rivertown Commons development in Frogtown, St. Paul. The medium size [...]
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‘A Walking City’
April 25, 2010
The Archigram Archival Project is an excellent collection of projects and concepts that were done between the ’60s and mid-’70s. “The Archigram Archival Project makes the work of the seminal architectural group Archigram available free online for public viewing and academic study. The project was run by EXP, an architectural research group at the University [...]
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Ben on FRESH the Movie Panel at Lucia’s
April 24, 2010
Ben Hertz, our director of innovation and sustainability, discussing the first harvest crop lineup that Lucia’s Restaurant (Proprietress, Lucia Watson pictured) Our very own Ben Hertz sits on FRESH the Movie, local food panel at Lucia’s Restaurant. Read some of the coverage from our friends at LoveFeast Table. “These rooftop farms show the possibilities of [...]
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Rooftop Farming and The Science Barge
February 1, 2010
As we move ahead in 2010, there are a number of things TCGMN is doing, including our work with Permaculture Research Institute and Ecological Gardens, a landscape design firm to help us build a live, productive rooftop for our Kensington Park retail project. The rooftop farm will incorporate the use of water troughs with Earthbox [...]
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Dynamic Streets
January 28, 2010
A good.is interactive piece about complete streets in The 21st Century.
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