It’s not precise enough to go from neighborhood to neighborhood; too bad, it’d be neat to see things get that specific. Instead it goes as small as a 1 mile radius. Otherwise we could see how badly some of those people in Southport are financed up to their eyeballs!
You can play around with it a bit by clicking here.
The recent surge in construction of “Big Box” stores in the Bismarck-Mandan area may have come to a screeching halt after shocking announcements released Friday!
Stores like this will only build in a certain metro area once its population has reached or exceeded a certain threshold, usually around 100,000 people. In order to recruit these businesses to the Bismarck-Mandan area, local community developers exploited the “100 mile radius” rule to define a Bismarck-Mandan “metro area” that met the requirement. This allowed them to include Dickinson, Washburn, Wilton, Jamestown, and other outlying communities.
But who’s to say that someone will hop in the car and drive 99.9 miles to do their regular shopping at these stores? Apparently, that’s not the case. After a minor surge in business upon opening, the local “Big Box” establishments now sit largely empty, relying only on drastic sales to try to recruit those elusive prairie customers. Now they want out.
“We were duped by the numbers,” said one store manager in an off-the-record phone conversation. “It’s worse than the ‘budget surplus’ of the Clinton administration in the 1990s, counting on revenue that wasn’t there. In this case, we’re counting on people that just aren’t coming.” Another store employee I bumped into said, “We’re not sure we’d have much business in building materials at all, except that the locals are tired of Menards selling ‘curly lumber’ all these years.”
Local officials deny that there was any sort of “massaging the numbers” at play here, but instead cite gas prices and winter weather as causes for fewer customers coming to Bismarck from the surrounding area. At an emergency city meeting, the question was posed: “Look, if they’ll just wait for Spring and Summer, we’re sure this trend will turn around. What sense does it make to put up a million dollar building, then cry foul and go home?”
To make matters worse, this devastating news comes on the weekend of April Fool’s Day, which means that by now you should have figured out that I’m pulling your chain. I had to make up a gripping April Fool’s joke from somewhere. Now go out to Best Buy, Kohl’s, Petsmart, Home Depot, or one of the other lovely new “Big Box” establishments and spend some money.
On a related note, if you feel the need to donate a Briggs & Stratton-powered pressure washer from Home Depot to the Bismarck-Mandan Blog, please contact me by email using the form at the upper right of this page. It will be greatly appreciated and immediately put to good use in a good home.
On my way to east Bismarck on Wednesday, I came over the hill by the Coke plant to see the whole area awash in a foggy haze. I thought it truly was fog until I saw this:
The DMVW railroad was warming up a couple of diesel-electric locomotives. There were actually two pairs but only this pair was smoking. I wonder who checked the oil? You could check it by sticking a finger in the air. It smelled like it was synthetic, too…that can’t be cheap. Or environmentally friendly!
I was on my way to the deep, DEEP part of the river bottoms for some wildlife photography Wednesday afternoon when I came upon this little obstruction:
Despite a nearly overwhelming temptation to throw it into four wheel drive and give ‘er the proverbial “onion,” I backed off and called it a day. There’s always the weekend…
* “Stymie” is an old Scottish colloquialism from the early days of the game of golf, meaning to obstruct a shot. For the definition of “colloquialism” please consult a dictionary or someone who’s homeschooled.
What’s weird about being near the bridge when it’s closed is that it’s eerily quiet in the absence of traffic. The only sound is the constant cooing of all those darn pigeons. That in itself is kinda spooky…what if they decide to revolt?
We’ve all had a taste of what life will be like while the bridge’s replacement is built…it’s not fun. Hopefully, once the construction on a new bridge gets underway, the process of building a new one will go quickly.
Some people think this bridge is just fine the way it is, and should simply be properly maintained. Others want it scrapped in favor of a new and better one. Then there’s the shock and awe brought about by its deterioration. And of course those who want it preserved as a historical item.
Personally, I think the historic appeal of this bridge died when they decided to put a concrete deck on the famous “singing bridge.” Now that it appears to be rusting and crumbling away, let’s replace it. But let’s do so responsibly. And I sure hope the next design lasts as long as this one has!
That’s where I met Jeff from Watertown, SD. He’s working for a company that is going through parts of the sewer system in Bismarck and preparing it for maintenance. The city will be putting polymer sock liners in some of the sanitary sewer lines around the city. But when someone builds a house and taps into the sewer line and weld their pipe to the main line, part of their pipe protrudes into the main line. That’s a problem for anyone trying to stuff a liner down the pipe. That’s where Jeff’s company comes in.
Thanks to Jeff for the explanation. He’s also got a couple of Canon digital SLRs like me and enjoys wildlife photography, so we had a really nice chat. It was quite gracious of him to explain everything he’s doing and take time during his busy evening to show me all the stuff that they do.
So just remember…the reason everything works the way it does is because the city’s got guys like Jeff and his crew that help maintain and upgrade the system. And they’ve got cool machinery to enable them to get that job done.
We printed out coupons from www.pizzaranch.com but didn’t need them…we got the buffet and piled on the salad and all kinds of pizza. This is a really nice pizza place! I am not the kind of guy to dig in to the Philly Cheese Steak pizza or other such varieties, but there were plenty of other, more traditional styles to pick from.
The room we sat in was decorated with memorabilia from the Mandan Fire Department, including lots of old photos which were fun to look at. I didn’t check around the rest of the place as it was pretty busy. I guess the word gets around!
One other cool thing is a tidbit I found on their website in their mission statement: “Our Vision…To glorify God by positively impacting the world we live in.” Nice.
Driving to Minot yesterday and at Coleharbor the Soo line train was loaded with big rocks. Driving around on the top of the boxcars and rocks was a backhoe that was scooping them out. He was actually able to drive from car to car scooping rocks. I did not see a ramp or anything to get up on top.
