What do you get when you put an attraction for (among others) yuppies with more money and concern for Mother Oerth than common sense in the middle of the second-worst neighborhood in the Twin Cities?<\/p>\n
Oh, what do you think<\/a>?<\/p>\n The Minneapolis Police Department\u2019s (MPD<\/span>) Third Precinct has issued an alert regarding a series of robberies\/assaults taking place on the Midtown Greenway bike trail and the adjacent Hiawatha light-rail transit (LRT<\/span>) trail.<\/p>\n According to the MPD<\/span>, victims have been surrounded by groups of 2\u20133 or more younger males, pushed off their bikes and robbed of wallets, backpacks or purses. The assaults have occurred after dark. In some instances, knives and guns have been used.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n They’re talking about the Midtown Greenway – the old railway trench converted into a cross-Minneapolis bike path – and the trail along the Ventura Trolley.<\/p>\n “Conservative” anti-bike activists please note – both areas were vastly higher-crime before the bike path.<\/p>\n Still, there’ve been some ugly incidents:<\/p>\n The most recent attack took place on Dec. 4 at around 8:30 p.m. along a dark and secluded stretch of the Hiawatha trail just south of the Franklin Avenue LRT<\/span> station. The victim told the Midtown Greenway Coalition that three young men \u201cformed a pattern\u201d in his path, ordered him off his bike and onto the ground and then stole his backpack. Afterwards, a gun was held to the victim\u2019s head and, the man with the gun said \u201cI\u2019m going to shoot this nigger.\u201d The assailants were gone soon after.<\/p>\n Another victim was referred to using that word in a separate incident on Nov. 21, in which the victim was threatened with a box cutter after stopping along the trail near Minnehaha Avenue.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n I’ve ridden the Greenway – never later than dusk in the summer. It goes through some dodgy areas. The LRT bike path – which allows you to ride from the Metrodome to Fort Snelling (and thence to points south across the Mendota Bridge) – is a nice ride, but it goes through some of the worst parts of Minneapolis. I remember riding south from the Riverside Park apartments (the hideous multicolor “New Town” towers on the West Bank that look like they were transplanted from some hideous Egyptian public housing idea) south to Franklin, where the path runs between the backs of warehouses and the LRT line, and silently crossed it off my night-time biking “to do” list.<\/p>\n In response to this ugly, violent crime, the Twin Cities’ perpetually-enraged community proposes to respond with…well, the usual: ineffective symbolmongering:<\/p>\n Take Back the Greenway …and lumpen passivity:<\/p>\n The MPD and Midtown Greenway Coalition offer these prevention strategies:<\/p>\n \u2014 Avoid the Greenway after dark. [That’s right. We merely citizens need to know our place. Everyone knows the city belongs to the scum after dark – Ed.<\/em>] Another idea; get your carry permit. And then you, the trained, authorized, permitted citizen, carry while you ride.<\/p>\n Remembering this event last summer<\/a> – where scads of permit-holding Minnesotans held an Open Carry picnic at Lake Harriet – perhaps a more effective “Take Back The Greenway” idea would be for a gathering of permit-holders on bikes to have a ride. Carrying openly. Or perhaps just doing bounding overwatch<\/a>.<\/p>\n That’ll get the thugs’ attention.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" What do you get when you put an attraction for (among others) yuppies with more money and concern for Mother Oerth than common sense in the middle of the second-worst neighborhood in the Twin Cities? Oh, what do you think? The Minneapolis Police Department\u2019s (MPD) Third Precinct has issued an alert regarding a series of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-crime-and-punishment","category-minneapolis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3803","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3803\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.shotinthedark.info\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nSaturday, Dec. 13, 4 p.m.
\nThe ride begins at the Midtown Greenway entrance near Calhoun Beach Club, travels the greenway past the Sabo bridge, then turns onto the Hiawatha LRT..<\/span> trail and finally ends at Grumpy\u2019s Bar, 1111 Washington Ave. S. in Downtown East.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n
\n\u2014 Ride and walk with others, rather than alone. [ “Hell is other people – Sartre<\/em>]
\n\u2014 Look for a \u201cBluelight\u201d phone on the Greenway that will connect you directly with 9-1-1. [ Right. Because a bunch of thugs who’ve staked out an ambush will be happy to let you pedal back to a “blue phone”- Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 Carry a cell phone and call 9-1-1 if you need help. [ Ditto – Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 Pay attention to your surroundings. Exit the Greenway at the nearest ramp if you feel comfortable or nervous about people you see ahead of you. [ At last, common sense. Of course, that’s always good advice, wherever you are – Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 If you are assaulted, try to stay calm and give the attackers what they want. The more you resist, the more likely it is that you will be injured. [ Actually, people who don’t resist are about four times as likely to be killed as those who do; SEVEN times as likely as those who resist with lethal force – Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 Wear a bike helmet while riding to reduce considerably your chances of injury. [ That’s just common sense, given how awful Minnesota drivers – “The Cairo drivers of the West – are. Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 When calling 9-1-1, give the operator your location. The Greenway is now listed as a street: Midtown Greenway East is the name of the stretch east of Nicollet Avenue to the river. [ Not dumb, obviously – Ed.<\/em>]
\n\u2014 Take time to familiarize yourself with the addresses of the cross-streets over the trail to help ensure quicker police response. [ Again, not a bad idea – subject, of course, to your having time to call in a report. Which, likely, will be after the perps are gone – Ed.<\/em>]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n