Minneapolis Neighborhoods
Cedar-Riverside
Presently, the Cedar-Riverside neighborhood boasts the largest community of immigrants in the Twin Cities, continuing a long history of ethnic and cultural diversity. On the other side of the river is the West Bank campus, which is also considered a part of the Cedar/Riverside area.

If you want international, authentic and diverse, try Cedar Avenue. African, Asian, and Indian are all represented here. Intercontinental Video offers a wide selection of international films. This street is also the scene of Cedarfest, an annual August music festival that draws a diverse crowd. Cedar-Riverside, also known as the “West Bank,” is a vibrant area with restaurants, pubs and cafés. In addition, numerous venues offer live performance, music and dance.

Franklin Avenue
Franklin Avenue runs east-west just a few blocks south of I-94, between 35W and the Hiawatha Light Rail Transit (LRT) stop.You will find the Avenue is an energetic and growing community. Bakers make your fresh bread 24 hours a day! Public art on Franklin Avenue include the bronzed “Mohegan” wolf sculpture, rock garden sculpture and authentic American Indian tipi.

Franklin Avenue Public Library built in 1914, and is the first of four city libraries built with funds from philanthropist Andrew Carnegie. The library has received historic designation from the Minneapolis Heritage Preservation Commission and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The new 3.8 million dollar renovation is spectacular!

Linden Hills
Linden Hills is located in southwest Minneapolis. It’s bound on the north by 36th Street West and Lake Calhoun, on the east by William Berry Drive and Lake Harriet, on the south by 47th Street West, and on the west by France Avenue, which is the city limit. The neighborhood, named by the developer for the linden trees and rolling terrain, was developed in the 1880s to entice homebuyers to leave downtown for cottages on Lake Calhoun and Lake Harriet. Most of the original cottages have been replaced by large bungalows and Tudors. The Lake Harriet-Como Streetcar (“Trolley”) line runs through the neighborhood. Built at the end of the 19^th century to connect downtown Minneapolis with the lakes, the historic rail line now only operates between Lake Harriet and Lake Calhoun.

Loring Park, www.LoringDowntown.com
The Loring Park neighborhood is located on the southern edge of downtown Minneapolis in the area immediately around the Minneapolis Convention Center. With a population of some 7,500 residents and more than 300 businesses and institutions, the Loring community is one of the most diverse and eclectic neighborhoods in Minnesota.

The Loring Park neighborhood is home to the Walker Art Center and Sculpture Garden, the Guthrie Theater, MacPhail Center for the Arts and Orchestra Hall. Many educational institutions also call Loring Park home, including Hamline University, the University of Saint Thomas, Minneapolis Community and Technical College, Metropolitan State University and Dunwoody College of Technology.

NE Central Avenue
A community rich in character, history, entrepreneurship, social service and creativity. This unique corner of the city, is known for its industrial and immigrant heritage, and is a medley of ethnicities, restaurants, parks and art. Originally the home of the Polish, Ukrainian, Lebanese, and German immigrants, recent years have seen the influx of Latino, East African, and Arab populations. The result is an area rich in diversity linked to the churches, schools, service organizations, and businesses that have long remained. The area is currently experiencing a fantastic revitalization with its old warehouses and factories being put to new use. From the community’s most beloved institutions and historic residences to the trendy boutiques and welcoming coffee shops, it is truly an inviting neighborhood.

Nicollet Avenue/Downtown
Diverse and delicious, it’s where East meets West, North meets South and the Upper Midwest gets a good Chile Relleno, Szechwan Wonton, Spanakopita or Wiener Schnitzel. African, Asian, American, Middle Eastern, Mediterranean, or Mexican: it’s temptation in the form of over 55 different restaurants and food markets in the span of about 17 blocks. Remember that scene at the beginning of “The Mary Tyler Moore Show,” when Mary flings her hat into the air with careless abandon? That took place on Nicollet Mall, the bustling shopping corridor that runs parallel to the Hennepin Avenue theater district.

Eat Street begins near the front door of the Convention Center on Grant Street and heads south along Nicollet Avenue to the new Midtown Greenway at 29th Street. While you are in the neighborhood, you may visit the Minneapolis Institute of Arts, Children’s Theatre Company, Music Box Theatre and many other cultural venues. The Minneapolis Institute of Art and The Children’s Theatre Company, both just a block off of Eat Street, sparkle with entertainment options during the holiday and Minnesota winter season.

Riverfront District , www.minneapolisriverfront.com
The Minneapolis Riverfront District is the historic “Birthplace of Minneapolis” that celebrates and entertains with an eclectic collection of historic buildings, scenic parks, cultural venues, dining, shopping and lodging, with the inspiring St. Anthony Falls on the Mississippi River as a dramatic backdrop. Breezy and tree-lined, this Central Park-like setting in downtown Minneapolis is the perfect place to unwind, explore and entertain. Moving to this community, you will enjoy the colorful and dynamic, it is a maze of beautiful parks and trails.

St. Paul Neighborhoods
Saint Anthony Park
A tree-shaded, upscale, upper-income neighborhood adjacent to the University of Minnesota Saint Paul campus, bordering Northeast Minneapolis on the west and the Minnesota State Fairgrounds on the east. It was the home to three Minnesota governors (William Marshall, 1866-70; Andrew McGill, 1887-1889; and Elmer L. Andersen; 1961-63). Originally set out as estates for the wealthy of Minneapolis, it has become a neighborhood of college professors, professionals, international students and ordinary working people. It is centrally located in the Twin Cities, providing a quaint, pedestrian friendly business district that contains many services – including many independently owned shops and restaurants. The Carnegie Library, with an excellent new addition for children, and the top rated St. Anthony Park Elementary School are the focal points of the neighborhood.

Cathedral Hill to Highland Park
The area there is aptly known as Cathedral Hill, and business and government workers from downtown gather for lunch in the bars and restaurants in the neighborhood’s Victorian-era buildings. Further west from downtown between I-94 and Ford Parkway, from Cretin to Snelling, are three private colleges. This concentration of college students makes for many energetic neighborhoods: Highland Park, Macalester-Groveland, Merriam Park, and Crocus Hill. Grand Avenue is lined with shops, restaurants, and bars. This area is heaven for those who like to browse, drink and eat. One block up from Grand is Summit Avenue, one of the greatest extant neighborhoods of Victorian architecture in the country. Starting at the James J. Hill House as a two-lane street, Summit turns into a broad, sweeping parkway, separated down the middle by a park like island that is frequented by joggers and strollers.

Como Park
Between Snelling and Lexington north of University Avenue is the Como area. It is a cozy upper-class neighborhood situated around Lake Como, the city’s main recreational lake. The Como Park neighborhood has many recreational facilities, including a golf course, bike path, various open fields, a pavilion, a municipal pool, and the Como Zoo, the only zoo in the city of Saint Paul. The Como area is also home to many of the city’s gingko trees. There are several schools in Como Park, the public schools in the area being the well-regarded Chelsea Heights Elementary School and the Como Park Elementary School, the only school in the city to have its own planetarium.

Hamline – Midway neighborhood
A solidly Middle-class neighborhood, with a population of about 12,000 derives its name from being midway between the downtowns of Minneapolis and Saint Paul. Famous Midway natives include Peanuts cartoonist Charles Schultz.

Payne – Phalen
The neighborhood ranges from a middle class area to the south, to a solid middle-class area north of Maryland Avenue, and includes some fairly upscale real estate around scenic Lake Phalen. It is also very populated, more than 30,000 residents.

Summit Hill
Also called “Crocus Hill” by locals, the neighborhood’s focal point is Summit Avenue, the traditional home of the city’s Robber Baron aristocracy; the boulevard was originally conceived as a broad, Gilded Age showcase street, and is lined with the mansions named after Saint Paul’s “old money”, most notably that of railroad tycoon James J. Hill. At Summit’s east end, overlooking Downtown, is the massive Cathedral of Saint Paul, home of the Archdiocese of Minneapolis and Saint Paul. Summit’s terminus, several miles to the west, is at the bluffs overlooking the Mississippi River valley. With its vistas of downtown and the Mississippi River, Summit Hill is among the priciest neighborhoods in the Twin Cities, and is considered to be a prime candidate for the longest stretch of preserved Victorian mansions in North America. It has been home to artists as diverse as F. Scott Fitzgerald (who once quipped that Summit Avenue’s gaudy estates collectively were “a museum of American architectural failures”), his wife Zelda, Sinclair Lewis, August Wilson and, currently, Garrison Keillor. More notorious residents have included 1930’s-era gangsters such as John Dillinger and members of the Barker-Karpis Gang.

Thomas-Dale
Dominated by University Avenue, Thomas-Dale is traditionally (and more commonly) known as “Frogtown” to the locals, and has been regarded as a neighborhood in transition for decades. Frogtown experienced massive problems as the center of Saint Paul’s drug and prostitution trades in the 1980s and 1990s. Notorious 1930’s gangster and John Dillinger gang member Homer Van Meter met his end in this neighborhood, during a police shootout at a University Avenue intersection.

West Seventh
Officially known as the Fort Road area, due to its location on old Native American and fur trader paths along the Mississippi from downtown to Fort Snelling. Known as “The West End” by locals (as distinguished from “the West Side”, more on that below), the West Seventh neighborhood is a traditional immigrant neighborhood located below Summit Hill and along the western bluffs of the Mississippi River, spanning the entire length of West Seventh St.(Old Fort Rd.) The West End is the historical center of the Twin Cities’ Irish, German, Polish, Italian and Bohemian immigrant communities, and is currently the center of Saint Paul’s Russian immigrant population.

West Side
The name is somewhat confusing to newcomers, as the neighborhood is actually somewhat east of the line bisecting the city; it’s the neighborhood across the Mississippi River to the south of Downtown, but technically on the west bank of the predominantly north-south river. It is the home to the largest Hispanic neighborhood in the Twin Cities, based along César Chávez Boulevard. The population is about 16,000.