Downtown dreams and reality

 

Downtown Cedar Rapids parking map

The City of Cedar Rapids is surveying residents on the subject of parking in Downtown and surrounding areas (Czech Village, Kingston, New Bohemia). (If you're in CR, and seeing this before Wednesday 6/11, contact me and I'll send you the link.) The survey mostly asks for data about destinations, times, and difficulty parking. 

According to my sources, the city is looking at removing meters from downtown, or else adding meters to other areas in the core. If we do remove meters from downtown, however, that will cut the flow of cash to ParkCR, the company to which we foolishly sold the parking concession in 2014, and which is already receiving less income than we had contractually promised. We would have to pay them off somehow.

Parking instructions from ParkCR, Third Avenue Bridge,
Downtown Cedar Rapids

I'm torn about the parking survey, regardless of how we work things out with ParkCR, because removing meters seems the best thing in the short run for downtown businesses, the city, but more free parking is not in the long-term general interest. We have learned from reading Donald Shoup (he's tough) and Henry Grabar (a much easier go) that free public parking in a high-demand area s a policy mistake, because setting the price at zero makes demand for any product artificially high. Too much demand for parking results in traffic congestion and noise and an unpleasant environment for anyone else in the area. Eventually, it results in pressure on the city to supply more, either through more public lots or parking mandates on developers, which wastes space. High-value land is yielding no revenue, and the empty space it creates between revenue-producing destinations makes the area less walkable and less interesting. Free parking is the enemy of vibe.

[If you're attending an Orchestra Iowa concert on a Saturday night at the historic Paramount Theater, profiled in this 1.75 minute video from Iowa Public Broadcasting, driving is your only alternative. Finding a parking space can be a challenge.]

Ideally, any city's core would be best advised to develop around non-drivers who are able to walk, bike, wheel, or bus to multiple revenue-producing destinations. I'm fixated on grocery stores and other suppliers of necessities, but Bill Fulton (2025) has observed that:

people who lived near downtowns and liked to walk places tended to drive to the grocery store or the mall, in large part because they want to have a vehicle to haul the stuff home. Since Covid, of course, many of these folks choose to order all kinds of goods online.

Maybe I should stop dreaming about groceries and hardware in the core? Even so, says Fulton, 

People who lived [near the downtowns he studied] tended to walk more when they had some place they wanted to walk to. And what they wanted to walk to most often was parks, libraries, cafes, and restaurants.

Our city's core is attractive, but what surrounds it is without form and void. 

Between 5th and 12th Streets, much of the space is
dedicated to parking

Hence, with respect to the very few who ride across the void on our incipient trails system, or utilize our limited public transportation, the only connection to the world outside the void is by private car. 

Whether we're talking grocery stores or "parks, libraries, cafes, and restaurants," patrons either come from close by or from far away. If they come from far away. Here's the paradox: The more parking our city provides, the less room there is for the places people want to go. Yet sincerely trying to build a walkable core by putting a price on parking is a risky game, maybe as likely to take businesses off the streets as to put people onto the streets and into destinations. "We don't want parking meters in NewBo," says City Council member Ann Poe.

Block-long free parking in Czech Village
does fill up on weekends

If you're reading this critically, you'll notice my argument is missing data. I've got none. What I'm also missing is a sense of what the city's vision is. A decade ago, Cedar Rapids seemed motivated to become an active town, bringing in the Blue Zones folks and building separated bike lanes. I really couldn't say what the city's vision is now, other than some vague notion of "success" based in attracting shoppers.

So, what's an urbanist supposed to write in the comments section of the survey? The market price for parking in the core area outside of downtown is probably zero, because there's so much of it. Maybe the best approach is to attend to the needs of core constituents now, even if that means (sob!) more subsidies for car parking and (double sob!) paying off ParkCR with money that would have been better spent elsewhere. Shoup argues for charging market prices for parking, with money devoted to improving the district where it's spent. That alone keeps the path open to a more vibey, financially resilient, walkable future.

If we've learned anything positive from the DOGE derecho,
it's that the national government is no longer a reliable funder
of expensive stuff

P.S. I wonder how many people who resent food assistance or affirmative action as "government handouts" not only allow an exception for parking, but expect that parking should be free?

SEE ALSO: "I Wish This Parking Was...," 27 November 2020

Iowa's legislature may never run out of symbolism

 

Iowa House Speaker Pat Grassley
(R-Hartford); from iowa.gov

Legislative session number nine of unified Republican control of Iowa state government ended about the way the first eight did: tax and service cuts, repressing groups they don't like, and full-throated support for whatever President Donald Trump is advocating today. Speaker Pat Grassley posted on Facebook that Iowa voters "send us to Des Moines to be your voice and to do hard things. The session was nothing short of working hard and continuing to do the hard things."

The hard things included some new laws with arguably laudable objectives. Late in the session, Speaker Grassley bragged on resolving conflicts over use of eminent domain to acquire land for a carbon capture pipeline; raising minimum K-12 teacher salaries; and banning student cellphone use in classrooms. Increased funding for community colleges supports a critical service. Requiring cities and counties to allow accessory dwelling units under certain conditions is one approach to providing affordable housing (Strong Towns 2025).

Yet the legislature also spent time on:

• banning drone surveillance of farms
• reducing unemployment insurance tax rates on businesses
• established quotas for Iowa residents in admission to medical and dental residency programs
• expanded work requirements for Medicaid
• removing gender identity from the Iowa Civil Rights Act
• removing perceived traits from the official definition of bullying
• prohibiting diversity, equity and inclusion positions in community colleges and local government
• barring use of Medicaid funds for gender dysphoria procedures and therapies
• lowering the legal age to purchase a handgun from 21 to 18
• barring sex offenders from serving as firefighters
• requiring voters to verify citizenship
• banning ranked choice voting
• banning citizen police review boards
• requiring the University of Iowa to establish a School of Intellectual Freedom

The complete list of legislative enactments is at Murphy 2025 (cited below).

The first two reward Republican constituent groups; the remainder are mostly symbolic efforts to establish in law preferred identities and behaviors. In the absence of real problems being solved, their purpose seems to be to make Republican voters feel better about themselves. That also accounts for U.S. Representatives Ashley Hinson and Marianette Miller-Meeks supporting national Medicaid cuts in the reconciliation bill currently before Congress (Nieland 2025), though a lot of what may seem like undeserved health insurance for the shiftless poor actually supports long-term care for the elderly (Nirappil 2025), many of whom live in Iowa and support Republicans.

Irving Point is an assisted living facility in the Oak Hill Jackson neighborhood
(from burnshousing.com)

I continue to question how these packages of rewards to supporters and punishments for others lays any satisfactory groundwork for Iowa's future. A low-tax, low-service state that's hostile to immigration is laughing in the face of demographic, economic, health care, and climate challenges that every place faces. The Iowa Senate Democrats posted: "Growing our state's economy requires attracting and retaining the best and brightest." Their assumption is that a prosperous future Iowa will differ from current Iowa demographics and culture. That is a principal basis of my using this blog to advocate for diversity.

International immigration in the early 2020s more than compensated for U.S. metropolitan area population losses during the pandemic (Frey 2025).  This is particularly important in cities near Iowa--think Chicago, Milwaukee and St. Louis--that have been prone to domestic out-migration. Frey notes:  "Nationally, recent population projections indicate that with low levels of immigration (the kind observed during the first Trump administration), the nation’s population would start to decline after 2043, and its labor-force-age population will show no gains by 2035." 

I don't doubt that these new laws reflect the priorities of the voters who have been sending Republicans to the executive and legislative branches. A Civiqs survey at the 100-day mark found presidential approval in Iowa at 48 percent, higher than the country as a whole, though lower than deep red states like West Virginia and Wyoming (McGrath 2025). This may create openings for Democrats in 2026, but incumbent Republican legislators and executives, including Governor Kim Reynolds, won their seats by comfortable margins.

Iowa Republicans remain allergic to difference, and keep governing like if the state had any problems they could be solved by returning to 1958. And they keep winning.

SEE ALSO: 

"Iowa and the Vision Thing," 24 April 2024

Tom Barton, "Reynolds Secures Most of Her Legislative Agenda," Cedar Rapids Gazette, 18 May 2025, 1A, 10A

Erin Murphy, "Which Bills Passed--Or Didn't--the Legislature?" Cedar Rapids Gazette, 18 May 2025, 9A

Grace Nieland, "Hinson, Miller-Meeks Support Medicaid Limits," Cedar Rapids Gazette, 17 May 2025, 3A

ADDED LATER:

Lydia Denworth, "People in Republican Counties Have Higher Death Rates Than Those in Democratic Counties," Scientific American, 18 July 2022

Bike to Work Week 2025

Trail crossing by Manhattan Park, Cedar Rapids

This year's observance of Bike to Work Week--or whatever time period is celebrated in your community--occurs in the shadow of a hostile presidential administration that has shown itself willing to stop at nothing to get whatever it wants. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy, a former reality TV star and U.S. representative with zero experience in transportation policy, has ordered a review of any federal grants that include bike infrastructure (Kuntzman 2025). While claiming bike lanes cause accidents and traffic congestion, he has removed research from the DOT website that shows the opposite (Wilson 2025). Viable alternatives to single-occupancy vehicles are the only way to reduce traffic congestion, as well as a key way to reduce climate change, but the Trump administration has scrubbed those data as well.

Why is bicycling so threatening to those now in power? Lyz Lenz (2025) notes the link to community building, which is itself threatening to an individualist ideology: "Project 2025 specifically criticizes the Federal Highway Administration for funding parks, trails, bike paths, and sidewalks--all the things that make our communities accessible and walkable." She argues that the Department of Transportation under Duffy "helps set in motion a vision of American life that is small, isolated, and alone."

Here on Holy Mountain, our vision is of an America that is large, connected, inclusive, and in no real way threatening. And by golly, spring is here, the sun is out, we have a good two weeks until the bugs show up, and there are bikes to be ridden! And who do we see spiking the guns of disillusionment, but our very own city, along with neighboring towns and the Corridor MPO!! Yes, Bike to Work Week is back, with innovative programming like commuter group rides and a Tuesday evening family ride with decorative lights encouraged.

Pedal for Pancakes gathering by the Cedar River

Monday, May 12 (high temp 84)

It was sunny and summery today, near-perfect weather for the start of Bike to Work Week. The week began with an experiment: replacing the trail "pit stops" of previous years with the first of two guided commuter group rides. This one left at 7:30 a.m. from McCloud Place on the city's northeast side, progressing down the Cedar River to downtown. I live on the southeast side, so I passed on scooting across town to meet them at that early hour, and settled for getting downtown in time to watch them cross 1st Avenue at 7:47.

Morning commuters cross 1st Avenue E

There were two city staff and three commuters, hardly a throng, but not bad for the first time ever. I wonder, too, if the decline in downtown office work since the pandemic affects the potential audience for this? Anyway, we have a base to build on. The afternoon return trip had several more riders.

Six years ago, British blogger Robert Weetman (cited below) wrote five questions to assess the bikability of a given route. The answers are admittedly going to be impressionistic rather than quantifiable, but arguably give the best indication of potential ridership, which I would say is the point of Bike to Work Week. 

Weetman's first question is...

Looking only at traffic-related safety, would most people allow an unaccompanied 12 year old to cycle here?

Maybe. Most of what I rode today was on appropriate bike infrastructure in manageable traffic. I encountered two pinch points that would deter many ordinary people from attempting a ride downtown during working hours. The 1st Avenue trail crossing treatment is much improved from its initial form, but it still would make me anxious if the 12-year-old put too much trust in it. This morning, as I awaited the commuters, a senior woman, resplendent in an all-purple outfit, approached 1st Avenue on her bike. She pushed the crossing light, and we crossed together. "Are they going to stop?" she rhetorically asked about the 1st Avenue traffic. "Sometimes they don't." Today they did. 

No traffic, no problem: Heading downtown on 3rd Avenue
at 8th Street

Later, when I was chatting with the commuters, they all said that most safety issues were at intersections. One guy talked about 3rd Street and 8th Avenue SE, where car traffic in the right-turn lane is competing uncertainly with cyclists in the bike lane. I brought up 3rd Avenue and 8th Street SE--yes, a completely different intersection--where the separated lane starts on 3rd, but first you have to cross 8th where cars are waiting (we hope) to get onto Interstate 380. I know the city's grid well enough to avoid this intersection, but I'm not 12 years old. Denver's Bike Streets organization has created a map to help people navigate that city safely on bicycles; maybe we could gin up something like that here?

Commuters gather at McGrath Amphitheater for the return trip

10th Anniversary Post: Neighborhood stores

 

Founded April 2022:
Cultivate Hope Corner Store, 604 Ellis Boulevard NW

One of my hopes ten years ago for urbanist development in Cedar Rapids was the emergence of neighborhood grocery stores. I'd been reading urbanist luminaries like Andres Duany and co-authors, as well as Jane Jacobs and Stacy Mitchell, who commended having daily essentials like groceries within walking distance. Though corner stores flourished a couple of generations ago--the 1953 Polk's Directory for Cedar Rapids lists well over 100--today the grocery landscape is dominated by big box suburban supermarkets and gas station-convenience stores. In 2015, the then-new master planning document Envision CR did not mention corner stores, although it allowed that newer developments on the edge of town could see "neighborhood retail or mixed use" near residences.

Closed June 2024:
Former Hy-Vee, 1556 1st Avenue NE

The ensuing decade has brought some though not very much movement in this direction. The versatile social service nonprofit Matthew 25 opened a corner grocery store on the northwest side three years ago. Meanwhile, however, the Mound View and Wellington Heights neighborhoods lost their grocery store when Hy-Vee closed last spring. There are a couple of "international" groceries in preparation, but they haven't opened yet. 

Opening TBD: Hornbill Asian Market,
 1445 1st Avenue SE (photo 12/31/2024)

And burgeoning apartment construction in the core neighborhoods have surprisingly (to me, at least) not resulted in local stores to serve their new occupants. 

The Neighborhood Corner Store is operated by Matthew 25 as a non-profit, and they seek donations of cash and produce. It has the potential to do a lot of good in what it calls a "former food desert," but may not be a model for widespread adoption of corner stores. When I talk to sympathetic people about the Neighborhood Corner Store, they immediately mention the shortage of parking. Of course, if you're coming from across town, that's going to matter, but that's not what corner stores are for. It makes me wonder if Cedar Rapids even "gets" the concept of corner stores, much less is waiting for them to supplant the large-lot suburban supermarkets?

Small groceries were everywhere in my early life; growing up, we did most of our grocery shopping at the Sunnyside Supermarket, three blocks from our house, albeit required crossing a fearsome state highway.

Former Sunnyside Supermarket site:
611 West Roosevelt Road, Wheaton, IL today

My only recent experience with corner stores came in Washington, D.C., where I spent a semester in 2018. There were three corner stores near our apartment, no doubt due to the neighborhood's unusual combination of wealth and population density. One of them, the Congress Market on East Capitol Drive, has since gone out of business. 

Congress Market, formerly at 4th St and East Capitol Drive SE

So has an Amazon Fresh store in Crystal City that had only opened in 2022, as well as two small-format Target stores (Del Maestro 2025).

So, I don't know. The argument for corner stores is compelling: As walkable destinations, they provide everyday opportunities for exercise, energy conservation, and community building. But are there viable business plans, and strong enough public preferences to choose corner stores over megamarkets? 

Dave Olverson's recent piece for City Builder blames zoning restrictions for the lack of corner stores, and so, in a talk for Cities for Everyone that focused on housing, does Missing Middle Housing author Dan Parolek. Addison Del Maestro, however, notes the difficulty of slotting neighborhood stores into metropolitan form that is decidedly suburban:

"Urbanism," after all, isn't just land use. It's all the other elements of a place scaled to urban land use. [Emphasis his.] That includes passenger and utility vehicles--urban firetrucks, the small cars that Europe calls "city cars"--for example. It also includes smaller-scale retail. But because the status quo everyday store has shifted from a small Main Street store to a big-box, car-oriented suburban one, localities and developers do not have a bundle of "off the shelf" retail concepts to fill out Main Streets, urban neighborhoods, and mixed-use developments. Residents want their own grocery store nearby or underneath the apartments, but most national and general merchandise chains do not really operate that retail concept at scale. (Del Maestro 2025)

Cedar Rapids found this out when city officials, actively but in vain, tried to recruit grocery chains into the former Hy-Vee space on 1st Avenue NE. I just don't think that zoning reform will be enough in our town, as long as grocers choose away from small stores, and residents are for the most part comfortable driving to supermarkets, as well as being anxious about the supply of parking being impacted by stores near their homes. 

Neighborhood supermarket? Folks in this subdivision
can walk to Hy-Vee

ORIGINAL POST: "Envision CR IV: Neighborhood corner stores," 28 May 2015

EXCITING UPDATES!!

"NewBo City Market Expansion to Field Neighborhood Grocery by Field to Family," Iowa's News Now, 8 May 2025

Rebekah Vaughan, "Developer Hopes to Bring Grocery Store to Wellington Heights, Neighbors React," KCRG.com, 6 May 2025