Dudgeon-Monroe shares the active Monroe business district with adjacent Wingra Park but also picks up Monroe further westward away from Downtown. Past Edgewood College Monroe becomes more mixed-use but still holds a couple solid business nodes. From an urban perspective Dudgeon-Monroe also excels at having great access to park amenities, comfortable 1910s-1940s housing, convenient access to Dwtn and the University, excellent tree canopy, a high level of safety, and quality urban massing running up and down Monroe Street.
For Dudgeon-Monroe to become a great urban district it needs more density, sidewalk infrastructure in the southern 1/3 of the neighborhood, better public transit access, more economic and racial diversity, more walkable schools, and much better housing diversity as for sale housing is expensive here and there are few apartments especially 1-bedrooms and studios.
Click here to view my Dudgeon-Monroe album on Flickr
URBAN STRENGTHS:
* Great ADA infrastructure and sidewalks.
* An excellent recreational trail runs the northern edge of the neighborhood along with a couple other shorter bike lanes. A couple dedicated bike stations as well.
* Great generational diversity with a good mix of kids, students, professors.
* Excellent tree canopy throughout most of the district.
* Great park amenities with expansive and varied lakefront acreage covering the entire length of the district. Attractive quad space at Edgewood College.
* Very safe community.
* Good cultural amenities including plenty of restaurants & bars, several cafes, several art galleries including a local neighborhood art gallery, a couple community theaters, a couple breweries, some good cultural amenities at the nearby Edgewood College.
* Good retail amenities as well including a Trader Joe’s, a pharmacy, a couple banks, a wine store, a bookstore, lots of gift stores/boutiques and creative stores, a several dessert joints, a couple gyms, a public library, several dessert joints, plenty of gyms, and a couple churches.
* Solid historic and modern architecture.
* Generally good urban massing but some auto centric wholes the further away from Dwtn you go along Monroe St.
* One of Madison’s trendier neighborhoods
URBAN WEAKNESSES:
* So so density.
* The southern 1/3 of the district has no sidewalks. Newer 40 & 50s development here.
* Some more curvilinear streets in parts of the district but connectivity is still retained throughout.
* Public transit is so so here.
* Pretty poor economic and racial diversity.
* No schools within Wingra Park but a quality public high school and elementary schools on the northern edge of the district in adjacent Regent neighborhood.
* Rentals are very limited but especially 1-beds. Some 2-beds available that lease around 2K.
* Not a ton of for sale housing diversity. Everything is pretty expensive here. A handful of 1-bed condos that sell btwn 300K-600K, Some 2-bed selling btwn 325K-650K, 3 & 4 beds sell btwn 375K-885K
Evaluating our Urban Communities [with a focus on America] 