Nicollet Avenue
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Nicollet Avenue ( ) is a major street in
Minneapolis Minneapolis is a city in Hennepin County, Minnesota, United States, and its county seat. With a population of 429,954 as of the 2020 United States census, 2020 census, it is the state's List of cities in Minnesota, most populous city. Locat ...
,
Richfield Richfield may refer to: Places Canada *Richfield, Edmonton, Alberta, a neighbourhood * Richfield, Nova Scotia *Richfield, British Columbia, a ghost town from the Cariboo Gold Rush United States * Richfield, California *Richfield, Idaho * Richfiel ...
, Bloomington, and Burnsville in the U.S. state of
Minnesota Minnesota ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Upper Midwestern region of the United States. It is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Manitoba and Ontario to the north and east and by the U.S. states of Wisconsin to the east, Iowa to the so ...
. It passes through a number of locally well-known neighborhoods and districts, notably Eat Street in south Minneapolis and the traffic-restricted
Nicollet Mall Nicollet Mall ( ) is a twelve-block portion of Nicollet Avenue running through Downtown Minneapolis, Downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. It is a shopping and dining district of the city, and also a pedestrian mall and transit mall. A ...
in downtown Minneapolis.


Route description

The avenue begins at Grant Street in
Loring Park Loring Park is a park in the Loring Park neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota. History Loring Park was established in 1883 after the passage of the Park Act, which first created the Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board. The park was firs ...
and continues south to West 29th Street/Cecil B. Newman Lane, where it is interrupted by a
K-Mart Kmart ( ), formerly legally registered as Kmart Corporation, now operated by Transformco, is a department-store chain and online retailer in the United States and its territories. It operates four remaining Kmart big-box department stores â ...
store, and begins again at Lake Street, continuing through
Richfield Richfield may refer to: Places Canada *Richfield, Edmonton, Alberta, a neighbourhood * Richfield, Nova Scotia *Richfield, British Columbia, a ghost town from the Cariboo Gold Rush United States * Richfield, California *Richfield, Idaho * Richfiel ...
and Bloomington to 107th Street just north of the
Minnesota River The Minnesota River () is a tributary of the Mississippi River, approximately 332 miles (534 km) long, in the U.S. state of Minnesota. It drains a watershed of in Minnesota and about in South Dakota and Iowa. It rises in southwestern ...
. Across the river in Burnsville, Nicollet begins again at Cliff Road West and ends at County Road 42. Nicollet is a major commercial street in Burnsville, forming one of two main streets of their Heart of the City downtown area. Nicollet is a city street in Minneapolis and Burnsville, while it is designated as Hennepin County Road 52 between 98th Street in Bloomington and W 61st St in Minneapolis (just north of the Richfield border). This designation resumes on
Hennepin Avenue Hennepin Avenue is a major street in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. It runs from Lakewood Cemetery (at West 36th Street), north through the Uptown, Minneapolis, Uptown District of Southwest Minneapolis, through the Virginia Triangle, the ...
in downtown Minneapolis, though the county highway is not contiguous.


History

Nicollet Avenue began as a military road between
St. Anthony Falls Saint Anthony Falls, or the Falls of Saint Anthony (), located at the northeastern edge of downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, was the only natural major waterfall on the Mississippi River. Throughout the mid-to-late 1800s, various dams were built ...
and
Fort Snelling Fort Snelling is a former military fortification and National Historic Landmark in the U.S. state of Minnesota on the bluffs overlooking the confluence of the Minnesota and Mississippi Rivers. The military site was initially named Fort Saint An ...
. It was named for early 19th-century French explorer and cartographer
Joseph Nicollet Joseph Nicolas Nicollet (July 24, 1786 – September 11, 1843), also known as Jean-Nicolas Nicollet, was a French geographer, astronomer, and mathematician known for mapping the Upper Mississippi River basin during the 1830s. Nicollet led thre ...
, who led three expeditions in what is now Minnesota.
Nicollet Mall Nicollet Mall ( ) is a twelve-block portion of Nicollet Avenue running through Downtown Minneapolis, Downtown Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. It is a shopping and dining district of the city, and also a pedestrian mall and transit mall. A ...
occupies the oldest section of the avenue. Before the mall was constructed in 1968, Nicollet Avenue stretched from the
Mississippi River The Mississippi River is the main stem, primary river of the largest drainage basin in the United States. It is the second-longest river in the United States, behind only the Missouri River, Missouri. From its traditional source of Lake Ita ...
to the
Minnesota River The Minnesota River () is a tributary of the Mississippi River, approximately 332 miles (534 km) long, in the U.S. state of Minnesota. It drains a watershed of in Minnesota and about in South Dakota and Iowa. It rises in southwestern ...
. One block of the street between 29th Street and Lake Street was removed in the 1977 to build a
Kmart Kmart ( ), formerly legally registered as Kmart Corporation, now operated by Transformco, is a department-store chain and online retailer in the United States and Territories of the United States, its territories. It operates four remaining Kma ...
store (opened in 1978) which covers two city blocks, detouring southbound traffic to Blaisdell Avenue and northbound traffic to First Avenue South. The city of Minneapolis has planned to restore Nicollet Avenue by reconstructing the Kmart site into a new configuration that would include both commercial and residential development since at least 2010. After a building fire at the former Kmart in October 2023, the building was torn down in November 2023. The city of Minneapolis announced proposed street layouts for a reconnected Nicollet Ave in October 2023. Construction is expected to start in 2025.


Transit

The
Dan Patch Line The Minneapolis, Northfield and Southern Railway was an long American shortline railroad connecting Minneapolis and Northfield, Minnesota. It was incorporated in 1918 to take over the trackage of the former Minneapolis, St. Paul, Rochester and ...
, a separate railroad serving communities as far south as
Northfield, Minnesota Northfield is a city in Dakota County, Minnesota, Dakota and Rice County, Minnesota, Rice counties in the U.S. state, state of Minnesota. It is mostly in Rice County, with a small portion in Dakota County. The population was 20,790 at the 2020 U ...
, ran parallel to the streetcar line between 60th Street and Diamond Lake Road. Nicollet Station, a carhouse originally built for the Motor Line, was acquired and expanded by Twin City Rapid Transit; after the streetcar system was dismantled in 1953–1954, the carbarn has since been used for transit system buses. The station is located at Nicollet and 31st Street, just south of the site of the
Minneapolis Millers The Minneapolis Millers were an American professional minor league baseball team that played in Minneapolis, Minnesota, through 1960. In the 19th century a different Minneapolis Millers were part of the Western League. The team played first in ...
'
Nicollet Park Nicollet Park ( ) was a baseball ground located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The venue was home to the minor league Minneapolis Millers of the Western League and later American Association from 1896 to 1955. The ballpark opened o ...
baseball field, which closed in 1955. The Metro Transit route 18 bus travels most of Nicollet Avenue. Historically, Nicollet had rail transportation, starting with the Minneapolis, Lyndale & Minnetonka Railway Co., also known as the "Motor Line". The Motor Line ran along Marquette Avenue in downtown Minneapolis, then turned west for one block at 13th Street South to reach Nicollet. The line was constructed south to 31st Street in 1879, to 37th Street in 1884, and was extended further south to 50th Street in 1887. It was converted to streetcar operation in 1890, and the
Twin City Rapid Transit Company The Twin City Rapid Transit Company (TCRT), also known as Twin City Lines (TCL), was a transportation company that operated streetcars and buses in the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area in the U.S. state of Minnesota. Other types of transpo ...
(TCRT) extended the route to Diamond Lake Road in 1911, 58th Street in 1928, and 62nd Street (now
Minnesota State Highway 62 Minnesota State Highway 62 can refer to two distinct state highways in Minnesota. *Minnesota State Highway 62 (Murray–Cottonwood counties) Minnesota State Highway 62 can refer to two distinct state highways in Minnesota. * Minnesota State High ...
) in 1947. Streetcars on the road had a service frequency of one every five minutes off-peak, and ran about twice as often during the morning and afternoon peak periods.


In popular culture

The avenue was used as a backdrop for the end of the famous opening sequence of ''
The Mary Tyler Moore Show ''The Mary Tyler Moore Show'' (also known simply as ''Mary Tyler Moore'') is an American television sitcom created by James L. Brooks and Allan Burns and starring actress Mary Tyler Moore. The show originally aired on CBS from September 19, 1970 ...
'', in which a jubilant Moore tosses her hat into the air while watched by a curious group of passersby who were, in fact, real people and not extras.


References

{{Coord, 44.9763329, N, 93.2726852, W, format=dms, region:US-MN_type:landmark_scale:10000, display=title Streets in Minneapolis