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I don't know the St. Paul area or its history, aside from the sketch given in the article, but the general story is familiar. Driving arterial roads through residential neighborhoods is incredibly destructive. Most crossings are eliminated to eliminate lights and speed traffic flow, so the neighborhood is split, and the noise, pollution and general ugliness poisons the blocks along the route. This is how you produce slums. I live in DC, on the east side. Our worst neighborhoods are either along the rail corridors, along commuter sewers or in areas where LBJ/Great Society social engineers dumped too many housing projects. Here in DC -- and I have the impression that it's true in many other places as well -- our worst slums are not organic products of the natural variations of life. They are the product of lousy planning, which dumped most ugly nuisances into the neighborhoods with the least political clout back in the 1960's and 70's. I'm with the black community on this one.

As far as I'm concerned, increase the gas tax and use the proceeds to dig tunnels. Put the commuter sewers where they belong, underground with the sanitary sewers. If you want to build a new arterial road into DC, I'll oppose it, but if it has to be done, build it through BCC, Cathedral Heights, Spring Valley, AU Park, Cleveland Park, etc. Rip apart and poison gentry liberal neighborhoods for a change. And at the other end, route it straight through the cul-de-sacs so the suburban cowboys can share the cost of the infrastructure being built for their convenience. If suburbanites don't want to pay for or live with these reasonable accommodations, they can take the train.

I'm with the black community on this one.

I am, too. Can't get rid of the highway, but you might be able to reunify the neighborhood by building this deck.

When Trump started all these initiatives for the Black community, Martin Luther King, Jr.'s niece, Alveda, called it a down payment on a bounced check, presumably referring to government promises made previously and not kept, as usual. This deck would simply be another payment, in that spirit.