photo by Mitch Rossow

Mayoral candidate Cam Winton, center, framed by the "winning" pothole.

On Monday afternoon, Minneapolis mayoral candidate Cam Winton held a press conference to deplore Minneapolis's commitment to its roads. Location of the conference? Inside a pothole.

Winton launched a contest to find the "Worst Pothole in Minneapolis" last week. After dozens of submissions, he crowned a winner: the figure-eight crater at the intersection of 38th Street and Zenith Avenue South, southwest of Lake Calhoun. There, in the middle of the street, Winton set up a microphone and campaign banner, and stepped into the pothole.

See Also:
- Who's in the race? A guide to the six candidates for Minneapolis mayor
- Minneapolis OKs extra $1 million to fight the pothole war
- Pothole of the day


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A council committee recommended awarding a contract for on-street car-sharing stalls to Car2Go rather than Hourcar.

Last week, Mayor R.T. Rybak took to Facebook and characterized a City Council committee's recommendation to partner with Car2Go for an on-street expansion of the city's car-sharing program as "a great development for all our neighborhoods."

SEE ALSO: Gary Schiff wants developer who wrote fake emails removed from Mpls housing board

But the committee's recommendation to work with Car2Go instead of local nonprofit Hourcar left many, including council member and mayoral candidate Gary Schiff, scratching their heads.

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Pretty soon, you'll be able to hop the train after the Twins game and head to a show at Station 4.

You won't actually be able to ride one until next summer, but the first train on the Central Corridor's tracks made its way from Minneapolis to St. Paul on Sunday.

SEE ALSO: Central Corridor undergoing redevelopment, but at what cost?

The inaugural downtown-to-downtown trip took five hours (it was pulled by a railcar mover), but things should move a little quicker once the Central Corridor is complete -- for real riders, the 11-mile trip from Target Field to the St. Paul Union Depot will stop 22 times and take 39 minutes.

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Minnesota Daily

Like the Midtown Greenway, the Dinkytown bikeway will run along an old railroad corridor.

Folks looking to bike to and from Dinkytown and downtown will have a new and convenient route at their disposal in just a couple of months.

SEE ALSO: The most- and least-bikeable spots in Mpls [MAPS]

That's because work on the "Granary Corridor" two-lane bike highway is set to be completed by the end of June.

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Image by Tatiana Craine

There hasn't been a passenger rail line connecting Minneapolis and Duluth since 1986. That could soon change.

Plans for a Northern Lights Express train connecting Minneapolis and Duluth recently cleared a major hurdle with the completion of an environmental report that found the high-speed line wouldn't have a major impact on the surrounding area.

FROM LAST YEAR: Plans progressing for high-speed rail to Chicago

According to KSTP, the state is spending $8 million on preliminary engineering work that will begin soon and could take two or three years. The total project cost is estimated to be more than $800 million.

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Patch screengrab

Thanks to a nine-figure typo, this guy's argument isn't as strong as it was days ago.

A group of St. Louis Park residents have been outspoken in their opposition to the preliminary plan for the Southwest LRT route, as it would reroute freight train traffic from south Minneapolis through their community.

SEE ALSO: Business community comes out in support of Southwest LRT

The group, Safety in the Park, bases their case on traffic, safety, quality-of-life, and cost concerns. With regard to the cost, they've cited HDR Engineering's estimate that keeping freight trains in Minneapolis would be $123 million cheaper than rerouting. But it turns out that number was off by nine figures -- HDR recently informed St. Louis Park officials their report contains a $100 million typo. The added cost of rerouting is only $23 million.

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courtesy Uber

A black car will take you to the polls tomorrow -- free.

Campaign volunteers have been amping up their phone calls in the past few days, flooding answering machines and voicemail boxes across the state with pleas to vote yes or no or him or her.

See Also: Uber, the car service for techies, launches in MSP

Sometimes, they actually get people on the line -- those bored or foolish folks still answering calls from unknown numbers during election season -- and if they do, one of their favorite questions is, "Do you have a voting plan?"

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courtesy Uber

Uber recruited Kevin Love to be the service's first rider in Minneapolis.

Halloween revelers hunting for cabs this weekend had a new transportation option: Uber.

See Also:
- There's an app for that: Communicate with the dead via a paranormal recorder on your phone [AUDIO]
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edmenendez | Flickr Creative Commons

Whoever these lucky commuters are, they're missing rush hour.

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KSTP

A vintage Russian fighter jet crashed at Flying Cloud Airport Thursday.

The pilot of the vintage MiG-21 is reportedly okay after his plane's crash landing into Flying Cloud Airport around 10 a.m. Thursday.

Eden Prairie spokeswoman Katie Beal said the pilot, who hasn't been identified, came into the landing too fast because the parachute used to land collapsed. The plane went past the runway, through a fence, and finally came to a stop near Flying Cloud Drive.

The pilot was reportedly flying the jet into town for the this weekend's 2012 Wings of the North AirExpo at Flying Cloud Airport.

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