Star Tribune officially closes on its stadium district land sale

The Strib's Janet Moore reports her paper has officially closed on the deal to sell five blocks of downtown Minneapolis to developer Ryan Cos. for a planned $400 million development, including a massive new Wells Fargo office complex covering two city blocks.

Plans also call for a nearly two-block public park, bounded by Park and 5th Avenues, between 4th and 5th streets. A parking ramp for the Vikings stadium, with either an apartment or hotel tower on top of it, will fill the fifth block of the property.

The sale marks the completion of a deal that's been in the works for more than two years, according to an interview with then-mayor R.T. Rybak in the December issue of Minneapolis St. Paul magazine. Ground is tentatively scheduled to be broken in April, and the project completed in early 2016, shortly before the new Vikings stadium is set to open in July of that year.

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