Bridge To Nowhere Meets Stair To Nowhere

September 19, 12:53 PMSouth St. Paul ExaminerRob Shirk

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It has never been easy to get around South St. Paul by foot. I'm not saying that we rival the legendary hills of The Bay Area in California or the daunting climbs in the Seattle, Washington region. But we do have our places. Ours happen to be man made peril.

The city is built on a series of shelves with the low, flood prone areas connected to the upper land sites and the town has seen its share of innovation trying to get up these hills. We never did figure out cable cars or any other way to get up the bluffs. We walked, for the most part, and a person can see the now the barely sevicable stairs going up in several area along Concord Avenue. There's one by the Wells Fargo Bank, for instance, and more as a person gets closer to the old stockyards heading toward St. Paul. Most of them are barricaded as they've fallen into disrepair.

There is a set of metal stairs in between houses further on up the bluff to the higher land sites. What we thought we got was a "Stairway to Heaven."  You'd better get to it fast, though, and be careful when you get there. Quaint? Sure. Safe? Ahhh.... I have no idea when the stairs were built but I have not seen but one or two souls ever use it and the reasons for it are clear.

It's easy to see how we got taken. If you lived on 9th and wanted or needed to get down to 8th it would be a whole lot easier to take a stairway rather than negotiate around the ravine via a city street. It seemed like an easier way.  But what would it get you once you got there? There is not a bus stop for an additional 4 blocks and there is no sidewalk to get you there if you wanted. It's a helluva get you got.

Going the other way, up the down staircase, if you will, gets you nothing. No sidewalk, bus stop, or anything. I guess if you happen to live right there it would be justified. The steps are almost completely rusted through and the corrosion throughout has given the entire span an instability that is worrisome. Whoa, Nellie! Further, the steps are not shoveled in winter. That makes for an interesting trip. Halfway up (or down) the stairs disappear, replaced with steeply graded cement, only to start again after 15 feet or so.

It is a Stairway to Nowhere. Sound familier? This is not on the scale of the Bridge to Nowhere and Gov. Sarah Palin has nothing to do with this. Somewhere, though, someone might have come up to the city fathers and proposed a stairway for the convenience of the good citizens of South St. Paul. I'm thinking the proposal came from someone who may have owned a construction business specializing in metal stairways.