The Ford Site: Exploring a New Urban Neighborhood

Highland Bridge, a new development between Saint Paul and Minneapolis, is being built on what was once a large industrial plant for Ford Motor Companies. Come explore the active construction of a walkable, urban neighborhood.

Highland Bridge is a 135-acre master planned development along the Mississippi River on the former site of Ford Motor Companies’ Twin Cities Assembly Plant. After its closure in 2011, the City of Saint Paul and multiple partners spent a decade engaging with the community, studying environmental impacts, and approving a plan for the site’s redevelopment. The master developer, Ryan Companies, and the City are working in partnership to execute the vision for a new connected, livable, mixed-use neighborhood with clean technologies and high-quality design for energy, buildings, and infrastructure. Highland Bridge will be woven into Saint Paul’s existing, vibrant Highland Park neighborhood with a multi-modal street grid, services and activities for every generation, and diverse mixed-income housing types. Upon completion, Highland Bridge will provide approximately 3,800 housing units (20 percent of which will be deed-restricted affordable housing), 150,000 square feet of retail space, and 55 acres of parkland. Mobile workshop participants will have the unique opportunity to see an active, large-scale construction site, and explore new urban parks, vertical mixed-use development, and high-density housing projects.

The Master Plan guiding Highland Bridge is built on an immense community outreach effort, including over 75 meetings with over 1,700 different community members in attendance over a decade. The Master Plan requires 20 percent of housing units to be affordable and accessible to community members with lower incomes.