Wisconsin Ave. & 27th St. Rendering

WIS27 LLC’s proposal to develop a 64,000 SF office building at the corner of 27th Street and Wisconsin Avenue was approved by the Milwaukee Common Council today.  WIS27 will purchase the vacant lot from the city for $1, and intends to lease the new building to the State of Wisconsin Department of Children and Families.

The $10 million project has been heavily debated within City Hall, as the design deterred the ability for tenants of the building to interact with the street.  Previously, there were no operable doors along the building, and all access to the building was to be through the secure parking lot, creating the potential for a dead zone along Wisconsin Ave. and 27th St.  As Alderman Bauman emphatically stated numerous times during a committee discussion on the project, “[it] basically violates every urban design principal that this city has been advocating for the last 20 years”.  Despite these concerns the city, led by Department of City Development Commissioner Rocky Marcoux, pushed to accept the proposal.

At that meeting Alderman Bauman was successful in holding the project to allow for more time for the city to work with WIS27 to incorporate changes that would better facilitate the building’s interaction with the street.  At meeting held just before today’s Common Council meeting, new designs by Korb Tredo Architects were approved despite earlier insistence by the development team and Marcoux that no new changes were possible.  Although, the building still lacks access on 27th Street, the Wisconsin Avenue entrance was enhanced for future use, and a 26th Street door was made operable.  With these improvements in place the proposal was approved.

An aerial image of the neighborhood where the Milwaukee Police Department Administration Building currently sits (Image from Google Maps)

Alderman Bob Bauman, who represents downtown and the near west side, has put forth a proposal to relocate the Milwaukee Police Department headquarters and municipal courts to southeast corner of 27th Street and Wisconsin Avenue. As part of that proposal the MPD District 1 station would be relocated to W. Wisconsin Avenue between 6th Street and the Milwaukee River and the former MPD headquarters would be redeveloped. Under Alderman Bauman’s plan, a single request for proposals (RFP) would be issued by the City for the development of the new headquarters facility, the new District One station, and for the redevelopment of the existing facility. The City would then lease back the new facility at 27th and Wisconsin. The lease back provision would allow the City to avoid the up-front capital costs of developing a new facility. Given that the current facility used by MPD has a looming maintenance and renovation bill of $58 million, all ideas should be on the table. This one in particular seems worth exploring, as it would go a long way to improving other problems.

Replaces one part of over-bearing government presence in neighborhood with potential additional, taxable use

Much of the western edge of downtown Milwaukee is plagued by single-use, superblock-style buildings. Starting at 4th Street and moving west, there are multiple 10,000+ seat arenas, a 5,000+ seat theater, the convention center, a large library, a large technical college, a large museum, multiple detention facilities, multiple law enforcement facilities, two different courthouse facilities, and an extremely under-utilized public square. In short, a number of vital buildings arranged in one of the least attractive layouts possible. The sum of all of the parts is not greater than the whole.

Removing the Milwaukee Police Department Administration Building, and having it replaced with a taxable, likely mixed-use facility is good for injecting activity into the neighborhood.

Adds additional investment along W. Wisconsin Ave

This project would involve significant investment at two points along W. Wisconsin Avenue. The downtown core would see investment as the new MPD District One station is developed. More importantly, the visible investment that Marquette and others (Ambassador Hotel, 2040 Lofts, etc., etc.) have made along W. Wisconsin Avenue would be extended westward to 27th Street. This would hopefully attract more investment to the area, which has struggled to generate activity west of 24th Street.

Adds active use at major city intersection (27th and Wisconsin Ave)

This point piggybacks on the one above, but it still is worth mentioning. The 27th and Wisconsin intersection has long been a sore spot for the City, with a struggling TIF district and a controversial gas station. Moving MPD administration and the municipal courts to the intersection would create an active use at an otherwise empty site.

Reduces potential long-term liabilities for the City of Milwaukee

With the city leasing the new facility at 27th and Wisconsin, they shouldn’t have to worry about long-term maintenance costs and could more easily relocate given future department needs changing.

It’s only an RFP

The City could elect not to go forward with the received proposals if they’re not satisfactory. Issuing the RFP isn’t a commitment to anything other than to evaluate the RFPs.

Wisconsin Avenue Today from Google Maps

Today, Wisconsin Avenue includes two lanes in each direction as it crosses the Marquette University campus. In addition, it includes wide sidewalks, a sizable, attractively landscaped median complete with Marquette branding, and curb space for bus stops and parking. At the time of the proposal, Wisconsin Avenue had three lanes of traffic in each direction, which enabled traffic to speed through the Marquette campus. It also lacked the wider sidewalks, and only had a small median complete with run-of-the-mill street lights. It was far from a grand avenue, and did little to make the campus seem worthy of one’s attention. Wells and State streets were also a one-way street at the time (they were converted to two-way traffic from 11th to 27th streets in 2004), further painting the campus as a mere pass-through on the way in-and-out of downtown.

In April of 1994 at the direction of the Common Council, the City Engineer coordinated a study (see: Footnote 1) of the impacts of the proposed closures, primarily on the existing transportation system. The report contains three alternatives for handling the displaced traffic, No Build, Alternate Route, and Tunnel. Ultimately, the Common Council adopted none of these plans, but for the sake of debate let’s examine them.

Background

The study includes a large amount of data, the most important of which I have attempted to include  in the scanned images shown below in the photo gallery. Of note, the closure of Wisconsin Avenue would have not only directly impact more than 22,000 vehicles per day that used the very stretch at that time, but 1,081 bus trips, totaling 17% of MCTS’s total buses in operation at the time, and approximately 22,000 daily riders.

Given the odd path the proposal took through the Common Council, and how divided the community was on the issue, there are a substantial number of articles available in the Google News archives about the topic.

Of interest, at one point covering Interstate 43 with a plaza was discussed as part of the plan. Something we’ve discussed in the past.

No Build

The No Build alternative was merely that. Close the streets to vehicular traffic at a cost of $212,000, and not provide a new thoroughfare. Buses were anticipated to be rerouted down to Clybourn Street, with an anticipated loss of 416,300 rides a year for an annual impact of $1,109,100 to MCTS. The City was expected to lose $58,600 annually. Most significant, traffic was expected to climb on Wells Street by over 30%, and on Clybourn St by nearly 60%.

This option clearly would have been the cheapest when considering the capital costs of implementing it, but it likely would have produced highly undesirable results. The additional roadways would have seen a significant increase in traffic, which would have made them nearly as bad to cross as Wisconsin Avenue was at the time (and arguably defeated the purpose of the closure). In addition, the closures would have made it more difficult to access the campus, especially given that there was no plan to convert Wells Street to two-way traffic with this alternative. Confusion to general motorists as to why a street abruptly terminated would have been a persistent cause of backups.

Tunnel

The proposed Wisconsin Avenue tunnel with the closed Wisconsin Avenue above.

I can’t imagine a tunnel was ever a serious consideration, and digging through the archives of the Journal and Sentinel seem to confirm this. Never the less, the plan called for $30,070,000 to be expended for the construction of the tunnel as well as sewer and water infrastructure relocation. Not budgeted was relocation of utilities from the Wisconsin Gas Company, Wisconsin Electric Power Company, and Ameritech. Who would have been liable for the utility relocation if the tunnel was built? Your guess is as good as mine, but it bears a bit of similarity to the current debate over the utilities and the Milwaukee Streetcar, as well as a major road project that occurred next door and required millions in utility relocation expenses, the Marquette Interchange. While providing a vehicle-free street to those above, the tunnel was expected to cost the City $46,400 annually in lost revenue and operating/maintenance costs, as well as having caused MCTS to lose 93,275 rides a year for an annual impact of $176,550.

Why this option was studied is unclear, because I can’t imagine a single scenario where Marquette, the City of Milwaukee, or the State of Wisconsin would have paid for this. Ironically, there were formerly tunnels under Wisconsin Avenue, but they were for pedestrians. They were in place from the 1930′s to the early 1970′s and were ultimately closed because of safety concerns.

While this option may have had the smallest impact on the city as a whole by still allowing traffic to flow in a near grid-like fashion through the area, I think it ultimately may have impeded access to the center of Marquette’s campus by forcing those coming by car, bus, or, at the time proposed, light rail to enter from the outside, instead of allowing street grid access to the heart of the campus today. All that in addition to the fact that the money just wasn’t there for this option.

Alternate Route

Long Diagonal Connector - Recommend Alternative

Multiple alternate routing options were studied, including a busway along Wells Street and a Short Diagonal Connector. Given that the Long Diagonal Connector with a two-way Wells Street was the recommendation of the study I will stick with discussing that. The Long Diagonal Connector was recommended because it had the smallest impact on traffic of all of the options proposed, while actually staying financially feasible, unlike the tunnel.

The Long Diagonal Connector would have pleased motorists greatly over the no-build option. It would have included the acquisition of property for a new roadway that connected West Wisconsin Avenue with Clybourn Street between 16th and 18th streets, allowing smooth access around the campus. It seems likely there would have be a great amount of political pressure applied to ensure this proposed road would be as free-flowing as possible, which in the long-run would have made Marquette seem like an island in the city by discouraging development facing it.

An additional part of the recommendation was to convert Wells Street into a two-way street from 10th or 11th to 16th or 17th streets, something that ultimately would not happen until State and Wells were both converted in 2004.

The diagonal street would have required the acquisition and demolition of buildings and parking lots, removing them from the tax-base, and no doubt influencing how and where Marquette has developed many of its recent campus additions.

The cost to build the Long Diagonal Connector and Two-Way Wells Street was estimated to be $9,840,000, with annual costs to the city of $82,900. The annual impact to MCTS was estimated to be $777,200, with a loss of 209,150 rides.

Conclusion

It’s easy to understand how the closure of Wisconsin Avenue might have seemed logical on the surface in the early 1990′s (see: Footnote 2). Wisconsin Avenue was a six-lane road, the university was struggling, the stigma of Dahmer hung over the campus (and city), Wells and State were one-way highways, and many of the new buildings along Wisconsin Avenue weren’t even on the drawing boards (Zilber Hall, Engineering Hall, the Blood Center, etc., etc.). Wisconsin Avenue was essentially a surface highway through the Marquette campus.

The proposal was sent back and forth from the full Common Council to committee multiple times, ultimately failing. At one point then-Mayor John Norquist offered his input publicly on the issue, but although his suggestions mirror how the configuration is today, even his suggestions were ignored for years.

The Avenue Commons proposal came down to one alderman in the end, with southside Alderman Robert Anderson changing his likely vote from a yes (which he voted in committee) to a no. He did so apparently at the suggestion of his wife, which angered some in the community. I’m pretty certain Anderson didn’t envision Wisconsin Avenue and Marquette interacting as they do today, but his change of heart has led to Marquette becoming a school that is well integrated into the city, and a far greater asset than it was before the proposal.

Street closures are generally a bad idea, the street grid exists to provide predictable, easy transportation for all vehicle types. Cutting off one piece not only makes that area harder to access, but increases stress on other areas of the grid. Couple that overarching philosophy with the street grids challenges near Marquette, including the vast amount of one-way streets, a number of abruptly terminating streets because of the hospital and campus, and the overwhelming barrier Interstates 43 and 94 create (and the lack of bridges that cross them), and it’s clear that closing that small stretch of Wisconsin Avenue would have seriously impeded the flow of thousands of bus riders and drivers.

It took time, until the Marquette University Campus Identity and Beautification was executed in the early 2000′s, but Marquette eventually got it right. Wisconsin Avenue is now the front-door to the campus, and an asset to the city. The street has been tweaked ever so slightly to remove a driving lane and calm traffic, streetscaping in the median has made clearly defined areas for pedestrian crossing making it safer for pedestrians and drivers, and signage has been installed to proclaim to all who cross that you are entering the Marquette campus, or rather “We Are. Marquette.”

Footnote 1 – For those interested, this report can be found at the Milwaukee Public Library. It is titled “Proposed West Wisconsin Avenue Closure – Feasibility, Cost, and Neighborhood Impact Report”. Some of the more wonk-ish reading you will ever do, but you might find it enjoyable. The scans presented in this article are from it.

Footnote 2 – The Milwaukee Sentinel (prior to the merger with the Journal) Editorial Board wrote a number of editorials endorsing the plan. They include (but aren’t limited to) editorials on April 18th, 1994, June 23rd, 1994, August 17th, 1994

Marquette University

Location: Avenues West, west of downtown.

Students: 8,012 (undergraduates), 3,587 (postgraduates)

Affect on Neighborhood: Marquette defines Avenues West. In addition to the buildings themselves, there are signs visible every which way you look, as well as students.

Recent Projects: The school has recently opened a new home for the Law School in Ray and Kay Eckstein Hall. The $85 million building is highly visible from the adjacent Marquette Interchange. Journal Sentinel art and architecture critic Mary Louise Schumacher details some of the challenges with the site. Under construction along Wisconsin Avenue, thanks to a $25 million anonymous donation, is the Discovery Learning Complex. The $35 million building will be five-stories tall and include 115,000 square feet of space for the College of Engineering.

On the Horizon: Marquette is working to enhance their existing investment in the Valley Fields athletic complex in the Menomonee Valley, a development that the school could have just as easily placed in a suburb. The school is planning to invest $1.2 million to add a 3,000 square-foot facility that includes dressing rooms for teams and officials, medical treatment areas, as well as public restrooms.

Grade: A. Marquette could have ran from Milwaukee like Concordia, but instead of fleeing they kept investing in their campus, and as a result have a great urban campus that keeps getting better.

Milwaukee Institute Art and Design

Location: Historic Third Ward

Students: 630

Affect on Neighborhood: Today MIAD has a minimal affect on the built environment of the Third Ward, though it does play a key role in the area’s art scene. Unlike Marquette and UWM, you can miss it as the college doesn’t possess a lot of public signage, with the exception of recently added sign on the school. It’s minimal affect also has a lot to do with how much else is going on in the Third Ward. If you placed it in the neighborhoods that the other schools call home, it would certainly have a much bigger impact.

On the Horizon: The college is seeking to build a new 250 bed residence hall. An RFP was issued and General Capital’s property was selected at 252 E. Menomonee Street . The school must now raise the funds to complete the residence hall.

Grade: B. MIAD students inject life into the neighborhood, without the town versus gown debate that makes UWM neighbors pack public meetings, and helped spur the art scene. At the same time the school hasn’t actually broke ground on the new residence hall yet. As the school continues to expand and improve its facility, increased visibility will follow.

Milwaukee School of Engineering

Location: East Town

Students: 2,438 (undergraduates), 210 (postgraduates)

Affect on Neighborhood: MSOE defines area around the few blocks it occupies, but with the exception of a couple way-finding signs you could miss it if you passed the campus only a block or two away.

Recent Projects: MSOE has added two new facilities to their campus in the past six years. The Kern Center, a large athletic and wellness facility paid for by Robert and Patricia Kern which is one of the few developments to actually happen in the Park East corridor. More recently the university opened the Grohmann Museum to house the General Studies Department and Man at Wok art collection. The rehabilitated building was paid for by Eckhart Grohmann, and operational costs are covered by revenue from the adjacent building, which Grohmann also owns. The buildings act as bookends for the campus along Broadway.

On the Horizon: Recently the school has proposed building a 500-stall parking garage in the Park East land immediately north of the Kern Center (to be funded by the Kern’s). The catch? A soccer field on top of the garage. The facility won’t be an architectural marvel, but being built into the hillside should help hide the garage (similar to how Juneau Village Towers and Yankee Hill Apartments work).

Grade: B-. MSOE has added two urban buildings since 2004, both of which help better define the campus and add to the attractiveness of the neighborhood. Unfortunately the university still possess a number of large surface parking lots on some of Milwaukee’s most valuable, and otherwise well developed, land. The proposed Park East parking garage should give the school flexibility to reduce or develop their parking lots into better assets for school and city.

University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee

Location: Upper East Side

Students: 25,239 (undergraduates), 5,216 (postgraduates)

Affect on Neighborhood: UWM currently dominates the Upper East Side, although much of that effect is achieved by the large amount of off-campus housing in the form of duplexes. The campus itself is well contained with a couple block area. You get the feeling you’re on a college campus many blocks from the school itself though as large numbers of students can be seen walking to and from class.

Recent Projects: The university, through the UWM Real Estate Foundation, has recently added three facilities along North Avenue, all of which include a sizable student housing component. The first UWM development in the North Avenue corridor was the Kenilworth Square Apartments, which includes apartments that can house approximately 330 students as well as street-level retail. The east side of the facility also includes facilities for the Peck School of the Arts. RiverView Residence Hall opened in January 2008 and is located along the Milwaukee River just off North Avenue in Riverwest it includes space for approximately 475 students. Most recently, the school opened the Cambridge Commons residence hall which includes space for up to 700 students and is expected to be LEED Gold certified.

On the Horizon: The university has plans to build three satellite campuses to house graduate-level schools. A School of Public Health is planned for the former Pabst Brewery on the northwest corner of downtown, thanks to a donation from the late Joseph Zilber. The university plans to expand upon their Freshwater Research Institute to build a new facility for the School of Freshwater Sciences. The water school was originally proposed for the lakefront, but plans for that location were ultimately dropped. The latest plan has split facilities between a Reed Street Yards site and the Great Lakes Research Facility on Greenfield Ave. Their most controversial plan is the one already underway, the construction of a new engineering school on the Milwaukee County Grounds in Wauwatosa. While we applaud the school’s efforts to build a new engineering school, we’ve written extensively that the location and proposed development style are misguided.

Grade: B. The university has a contract with Milwaukee County to purchase suburban land and develop it in a suburban fashion. That alone wouldn’t be so egregious, but as the school continues to invest in all kinds of “green” and urban developments across the city, the Engineering School in western Wauwatosa appears to be even more of a paradox. If the university follows through on plans to build the suburban engineering campus, it’s easy to believe that future grades on the schools urban qualities would be lower. On the upside, the school’s new residence halls have been successful in reducing pressure on non-student neighbors by reducing the number of students living in off-campus housing. They also, thanks to their good urban design, are part of what continues to make North Avenue vibrant. The Public Health and Freshwater Sciences Schools are certain to be assets to the city when they’re completed.

Cincinnati's Planned Freeway Cap Park

For cost reasons, it’s most efficient to cover a trenched freeway rather than to replace an elevated freeway with a tunnel (as Boston did). In Dallas construction of a five-acre park over a trenched freeway (Woodall Rodgers Freeway) will connect downtown Dallas with the thriving Uptown neighborhood. The connection will be further enhanced with the expansion of the M-Line Streetcar through the park.

In 1976 Seattle completed Freeway Park, a 5.2 acre park that covered part of their newly completed freeway. The park has recently been reinvented following a 2002 murder and a number of other crimes. The park is adjacent to the city’s convention center in the heart of the city. Phoenix has a tunneled Interstate 10 and built a park on top (Margaret T. Hance Park).

A number of other cities have plans in place to cap freeways. Cincinnati has pilings in place to build a park over Fort Washington Way that would connect downtown with their redeveloping riverfront (UrbanCincy review of the proposal). The Los Angeles area has a number of plans in various states of completion to cap freeways everywhere from downtown to Hollywood. Oak Park, IL has studied capping the Eisenhower Expressway. St. Louis has a design competition underway to redevelop the grounds around the Gateway Arch, with a number of the designers recommending capping the freeway, and the City to River movement recommending replacing the freeway with a boulevard.

A Freeway Cap Park in Milwaukee

A cap over Interstate 43? It's an idea that's happening elsewhere in the country.

How could a freeway cap be utilized in Milwaukee? The most logical spot to build one is north of the Marquette Interchange over Interstate 43 connecting Westown and Avenues West. It could stretch as far north as the Winnebago Street bridge.

The benefits? A freeway cap park would finally make Marquette University feel like it’s part of downtown, instead of just outside of it. This might cause future Marquette student housing (be it built by the university or private interests) to be built in Westown. If the park cap was built far enough north, it’s possible that The Brewery redevelopment might cause a positive spillover effect onto the neighborhood west of it that’s currently underutilized. It also may encourage may infill development in the eastern portions of Avenues West as the park would eliminate the gorge that currently separates the neighborhood from downtown.

Taking the pessimistic viewpoint, a Interstate 43 freeway cap park might not produce much benefit for a number of reasons though. For one, they’re really expensive  to build (~$500 square-foot) so the city would need to recoup a lot of value from new development. Unfortunately, despite the park likely being an attractive space, there isn’t a whole lot of land for development in the area. The Milwaukee County Courthouse consumes much of the east side I-43 as it traverses downtown, drastically limiting the amount of higher value land for redevelopment. The land that isn’t the Courthouse east of the freeway is park land that is already underutilized that likely couldn’t be redeveloped because of it’s proximity to the courthouse.

On the west side of I-43 there is likewise a shortage of land for redevelopment. Aurora Sinai Medical Center occupies most of the land. The parcel north of the medical center that could be redeveloped is unfortunately located just across the potential park from the Milwaukee Secure Detention Facility (more commonly, “the jail”) handicapping it’s value.

Outside of the area where the capped park could be built, there is likely too much available land in downtown Milwaukee over the next 10 years to effectively return value on the park. The Park East Freeway removal has left a lot of land in county hands, which they’ve been unsuccessful in selling. The Milwaukee Intermodal Station has generated more demand in that area, along with the planned Milwaukee Streetcar and potential Post Office relocation, that’s a lot of land that is set to become available soon. The recently unveiled Downtown Plan also plans for more development near the lakefront and redeveloping MacArthur Square to include potential development sites.

There would be a large amount of value to be captured if the elevated Interstate 794 was to be removed or lowered east of the river, but the lack of political will to do anything other than redeck the Hoan Bridge appears to have doomed any discussion of that issue.

Cities like Dallas and Cincinnati seem poised to capture a lot of value with the cap parks, but they’re using them to connect two thriving neighborhoods. Avenues West, despite a highly laudable continued series of investments by Marquette is not as strong as Uptown in Dallas. Avenues West and Westown will be stronger in the future, and at that point there will be more value to capture with a park to bridge the gap, but until then it would be wise for the focus to be on infill development.

While there are benefits to building the freeway cap park, ultimately Milwaukee is best to invest elsewhere at this time. Building a freeway cap park will likely someday be a good idea, but it doesn’t seem economically feasible in the next 10 to 20 years. Investing and improving connection tools (the Streetcar, the Riverwalk) as well as generating more infill development in the areas outlined by the Downtown Plan appear to be the most promising way for the city to generate a solid return-on-investment with new development.

This initiative draws on some of Milwaukee’s great assets and lays the groundwork for future enterprises, but it raises an important question.  Wouldn’t it be easier to continue these efforts in the future if UWM wasn’t planning on moving much of the College of Engineering and Applied Sciences further away from the other partner universities and companies?

If these efforts grow and there is more interaction between these universities, sharing more than just data, but labs and researchers, it is likely the proposed Wauwatosa site could be a hindrance.  The ability to walk out MSOE’s door and quickly into Marquette or UWM’s new research facility just down the block or on a ten minute bus ride would be a time saver, rather than a thirty minute drive to Wauwatosa .  Better yet, with this clustering, the possibility of the building of shared research labs and facilities, is a possibility.  It is of course possible to collaborate over the web, email, or phone, but the value of working in the same lab, debating around the “water cooler,” or sketching out ideas on a whiteboard is invaluable, all of which would be better accommodated if the university research facilities were located in close proximity to each other.

Wouldn’t a cluster of UWM, Marquette, and MSOE in downtown Milwaukee all working together on energy research and green technologies just make sense?

As the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee looks to Wauwatosa for expansion, Marquette is continuing their connection within Milwaukee by building their law school’s new Eckstein Hall in downtown Milwaukee and has plans for new engineering facilities under development. Marquette has recently broken ground on Eckstein Hall which when completed in the summer of 2009 will include courtrooms, classrooms, offices, a conference center, a reading room and a 170-space underground parking garage.

The Ambassador Hotel, whose primary customers are parents of Marquette students and alumni, is undergoing a significant addition that will add meetings rooms, a banquet facility and a parking structure. This expansion unlike many of the hotel proposals in the Milwaukee is not looking for government assistance despite doing a significant multi-million dollar expansion during an economic downturn.

In contrast to the 3rd district where heated debate has revolved around the possible location of a new UWM dorm, in downtown the highly successful 2040 Lofts private dorms has proven that well done dorm facilities can be a benefit to the neighborhood. The Scion Groups’ 2040 Lofts $16.5 million expansion project has risen quickly and is fast approaching its topping off. This second building will be known as “The Signature Suites at 2040 Lofts,” and will add 240 beds of high-end managed student housing. Each unit will include stainless steel appliances, WI-FI, and hardwood-style floors.

But what about the dream jobs we all wish for? I’m not talking about professional basketball player and former Milwaukee Buck Yi Jianlian (nor Australian Andrew Bogut). I’m talking about CEOs of growing and profitable companies. CEOs of technology companies.

According to Vivek Wadhwa’s research…

In over 25 percent of tech companies founded in the United States from 1995 to 2005, the chief executive or lead technologist was foreign-born. In 2005, these companies generated $52 billion in revenue and employed 450,000 workers. In some industries, such as semiconductors, the numbers were much higher—immigrants founded 35 percent of start-ups. In Silicon Valley, the percentage of immigrant-founded start-ups had increased to 52 percent.

When we looked into the backgrounds of these immigrant founders, we found that they tended to be highly educated—96 percent held bachelor’s degrees and 74 percent held a graduate or postgraduate degree. And 75 percent of these degrees were in fields related to science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

The vast majority of these company founders didn’t come to the United States as entrepreneurs—52 percent came to study, 40 percent came to work, and 6 percent came for family reasons. Only 1.6 percent came to start companies in America. They found that the United States provided a fertile environment for entrepreneurship. Even though these founders didn’t come to the United States with the intent, they typically started their companies around 13 years after arriving in the country.

Most students and skilled temporary workers who come to the United States want to stay, as is evident from the backlog for permanent resident visas. Yet we’re leaving these potential immigrants little choice but to return home. “The New Immigrant Survey,” by Guillermina Jasso of New York University and other leading academics, found that approximately one in five new legal immigrants and about one in three employment principals either plan to leave the United States or are uncertain about remaining. These surveys were done in 2003, before the backlog increased so dramatically.

Clearly if the United States is to stay competitive we must continue to work to make it easier for immigrants to enter the country, get an education, and stay.

If Milwaukee aims to be a leader in the freshwater science field a key piece of the formula is simple. Make Milwaukee attractive and welcoming to immigrant students. Make them feel welcome while they’re here, and help them stay after they graduate.

It’s as easy as ensuring that you’re a pleasant passer-by on the street and as difficult as ensuring immigrants can get loans as easily as locals to start businesses in Milwaukee.

Making more permanent resident visas available, especially for those here already under H1B temporary work visas, is essential to continuing to fuel the US economy.

Regardless whether it is John McCain or Barack Obama end up in the White House, they need to ensure that more visas are available for immigrants to get here, and to stay.

Immigrants are merely creating jobs for themselves, they’re creating jobs for you and your neighbors.

Hat tip to Richard Florida for exposing Vivek’s work.

I’ve never heard a good reason for why the rule is in place or how one can get around the rule (outside of simply ignoring it like many landlords do).

DailyReporter.com finally gave me an answer to all of my questions.  It turns out that it’s mainly a financial issue for keeping the rule on the books.  Reducing the number of occupants per residence limits the potential income of a landlord and helps slow any burning desires they have to buy up the entire block with the income from packing 5 people (probably students) into a house, and turning the neighborhood into a slum lord’s paradise.

This rule has the greatest affect in the areas surrounding universities in the city, primarily UW-Milwaukee.

There is of course always the factor that 4 or 5 college students together in one residence can cause trouble, but the prevailing reason for the rule seems to be the financial factor.

To get around the rule you can simply claim someone you’re living with is your cousin, but Alderman D’Amato is leading the charge to tighten that loophole by requiring residents be first cousins, and not simply cousins to get around the requirement.

• Seattle mayor Greg Nickels is working on a plan that will encourage all city employees to use public transportation, by giving the free transit passes.  Milwaukee should get behind this.
• The Daily Reporter has a good look at the issues affecting the 27th Street ramp off of Interstate 94.
• Thrivent Financial for Lutherans has made a significant donation to promote the improvement of the Harambee neighborhood.  It would be great to see more companies jump on board to help the process along.
• Neal Peirce has a piece on the rebirth of rail as a well-traveled mode for inter-city movement.  He mentions how a leader is Frank Busalacchi, who ironically has been nothing but car happy in the past couple of years (failure of KRM funding source, expansion of I-94).
  • But state initiatives are also vital. Wisconsin Transportation Secretary Frank Busalacchi heads the "States for Passenger Rail Coalition" of 30 state transportation departments appealing for an 80-20 federal-state funding split to put some real steam behind rail expansion.
• The National Corridors Initiative is hosting a conference, "Carmichael Conference On The Future of American Transportation", in St. Louis discussing the promotion and expansion of inter-city rail travel in the United States.  I won’t be able to attend because of financial reasons (if you have $300 to pay for the conference and hotel, let me know), but look forward to seeing the results.  Inter-city transit is a huge boost for urban areas and Milwaukee could certainly use a boost with more linking with nearby Madison, Green Bay, Kenosha, and Racine.
• The Milwaukee Public Library system will no longer transfer movies, television shows, or music CDs around the system and to the suburban libraries in a move that will cut costs and allow the system to be open longer.  I would like to see the system only transfer the media within Milwaukee and not to the suburbs, as I think it gives more access for the people of Milwaukee, especially those that benefit from the free resources of the library most.  Unfortunately, the system has decided to go with an all or nothing route.  I am glad that they chose this route over closing the library earlier though, as I think libraries having longer hours are a great way to deter juvenile crime.
• An intelligent look at how individual route management might work in New York City and does work in Copenhagen.  MCTS could use something like this for areas of its system to improve service.  Bus design and management should certainly be different for routes that serve UWM and Marquette vs those that serve primarily the workforce.

• Mary Louise Schumacher is yet another art person doesn’t think it’s a good idea to build a recognizable landmark that will increase pedestrian traffic in downtown Milwaukee.
• Hofbrauhaus Milwaukee, a proposed German beer hall and restaurant, is likely coming next The Brewery development at the old Pabst brewery in Blue Ribbon Hall after the settlement of a lawsuit involving Brew City Redevelopment LLC with the complex’s former owners, WisPark LLC. The article makes no mention of the existing Old German Beer Hall and how urban Milwaukee is delightfully reinventing itself more in the fashion of a city like Munich, Germany.
• Robert Kern, of Generac fame and fortune, is powering a change in the way the state handles engineering education through his foundation (Kern Family Foundation). Two urban Milwaukee schools are at the center of this in MSOE and Marquette, through the recruitment of Project Lead the Way students form high schools and their participation in KEEN (Kern Entrepreneurship Education Network). Urban Milwaukee would like to applaud the efforts of Robert Kern for his visionary leadership in truly investing in the future of Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and the entire Fresh Coast economy and education system.
• The Journal Sentinel takes a look at how you can reduce your power consumption and what effects it will have. Absolutely worth your time to read.
• Dave Reid takes a look at the Kane Commons development and gives us a construction update of the Breakwater Condos and The Residences on Water.

Public perception of Milwaukee’s university campuses is that they’re a step shy of being a war zone at night. Unfortunately for fear mongers everywhere, they’re not.  The latest shooting on the UWM campus has again brought about discussion about how dangerous Milwaukee’s urban college campuses are compared to the rest of the state.  Milwaukee undeniably has more crime than other cities in the state, however, it does not have to be that way.

What’s going on that creates random robberies on Milwaukee’s campuses?

The issue is two-fold. First, Milwaukee has a crisis level of unemployment when it comes to African-American males. This has the trickle down effect of creating a central city that has a crime problem. It’s hard for unemployed parents to be good parents. It’s also hard for those people to be good neighbors and members of society. It’s certainly not solely an African-American issue, as the issue affects everyone. It’s also not just a Milwaukee issue, it’s a Wisconsin and nationwide problem. Those without jobs are trapped within inner cities as they are even more rejected as members of society in smaller towns. It’s an issue that starts with one group of people and spills over to affect everyone. The Fourth Street Forum from two weeks ago touched on this. No one has a good solution to end it currently other than to end racism, which despite being the 21st century seems to be easier said than done for a large part of America.

So you need to understand that there is a structural problem that creates this mob of teens with a lack of true role models and a feeling that they’re trapped in a never ending situation. They instead turn to crime and prey on those that are the weakest, unsuspecting college students.

The second part of the issue is the lack of pedestrian density in many areas surrounding UWM, MSOE, MIAD, and Marquette. These campuses are populated with students who come from all over Wisconsin and the Midwest and have primarily grown up with a lifestyle of riding in "Lexus cages." They’re not sure what to look for when it comes to potential robbers and prefer to ride everywhere in automobiles. Students aren’t forced to deal with this change in scenery when they go to a college like UW-Whitewater and are accustomed with how to avoid bad situations.  It’s not that residents of Milwaukee are hostile towards college students and seek to rob them once the sun sets compared to boring (yes, I said it) "college towns" like Whitewater or Menomonee, it’s that those that struggle to get by in Wisconsin ultimately end up in Milwaukee where there are supposedly more jobs.  They don’t find that when they get here and ultimately contribute in some way, shape, or form to what is a higher crime rate.

How do we fight this problem?  First off, it’s crucial to acknowledge that it is not one problem of schools in Milwaukee being unsafe.  It is two separate problems that cross paths.  The first problem is crime caused by unemployment, which I won’t go into anymore in this article.  The second problem is to help students to be protected against predators.

The second problem has been traditionally  counteracted by the placement of security points around campus where students can push a button to call for help and the increased presence of police patrols. Both are band-aids for bullet wounds, which as of Monday night became a bit too literal of analogy for one student.  These stop-gap measures are ineffective for helping students when a robber assaults them with a gun on the sidewalk.  As I found out the hard way with a shotgun barrel to my head this summer, you can’t ask a robber to stop so you can call 911 or run for help.

What Milwaukee’s universities and colleges need to do is unite around the idea of pedestrian friendly campuses. The easiest way to accomplish this is to continue to increase density in the areas surrounding campus with the construction of larger apartment and university buildings. The city can and should get involved by promoting logical development of nearby commercial establishments. The creation of well-lit walking paths to and from these buildings is the crucial x-factor to the development of a safe, healthy neighborhood. Too often, especially by UWM, students must walk from a well-lit campus building into a dimly lit street that does not encourage night walking.

The important thing is that future development must encourage students not to drive, but to walk everywhere. Safety will only emerge from increasing the number of pedestrians on the street at night, not the number of police offers. Linking these emerging pedestrian neighborhoods by light-rail systems or properly marketed bus systems will further increase their development and safety.

Big cities and their respective university campuses do not create crime and can in fact prevent it and improve their residents quality of life by creating dense neighborhoods that rely on pedestrian transit.

Milwaukee’s campuses are not dangerous and you should feel safe walking on them. Students need to remember that if they’re walking alone at night to stay on well trafficked streets and to help their fellow peers by choosing to walk to other destinations in the area. Every time someone chooses to walk on campus at night they are helping make the campus safer by decreasing the chance a predator will find a lone student walking at night.

As former Milwaukee mayor John Norquist advocates in his book, the Wealth of Cities, the safest city streets are the ones with the most walkers at all times of the day. Let’s help Milwaukee become a safer place for people to live, work, and play.