Cedar - Isles - Dean

Cedar - Isles - Dean — commonly abbreviated CIDNA, after the Cedar - Isles - Dean Neighborhood Association — is a small residential neighborhood in Southwest Minneapolis, occupying the corridor between Cedar Lake to the north and west and Lake of the Isles to the east. It is bounded roughly by Cedar Lake to the north, Kenwood Parkway and Lake of the Isles Parkway to the east, West Lake Street and the Midtown Greenway to the south, and Cedar Lake Parkway to the west. Approximately 3,000 people live here, making it one of the smaller neighborhoods in the city by population.

What distinguishes CIDNA from its neighbors is its ratio of green space to residential area. A remarkable percentage of the neighborhood's geography is park, lake, trail, or wetland. The Kenilworth Trail runs through its center. Dean Parkway connects Cedar Lake to Lake of the Isles along a tree-lined boulevard. Cedar Lake Park and its islands provide habitat and hiking. The result is a neighborhood that feels more like a nature preserve with houses than a city neighborhood with parks. There is no commercial district — not a single restaurant, shop, or coffee house within the neighborhood boundaries. What there is, in abundance, is landscape.

The land between Cedar Lake and Lake of the Isles was part of the ancestral homeland of the Dakota people. Both lakes — and the wetlands, streams, and woodlands connecting them — were features of a living landscape that sustained Dakota communities through fishing, wild rice harvesting, and seasonal camps. The corridor between the lakes, now occupied by the Kenilworth Trail, was a natural travel route through the area long before it became a railroad right-of-way.

European-American development of the area came in stages. The Minneapolis Park Board acquired the land around the lakes in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as part of its ambitious program to create a continuous chain of parks and parkways. Cedar Lake was less developed than Lake of the Isles — its shores were marshy and wooded, less amenable to the formal parkway treatment applied to the Isles — and it retained a wilder character that persists today. Dean Parkway, named for an early Minneapolis landowner, was constructed to connect the two lakes, establishing the geographic spine of the neighborhood.

The railroad corridor that now carries the Kenilworth Trail was originally part of the Minneapolis & St. Louis Railway, later absorbed into the Chicago & North Western system. Freight trains ran through the corridor for decades, and the rail right-of-way shaped the neighborhood's development by creating a linear barrier that separated Cedar Lake from Lake of the Isles. When rail traffic declined, the corridor was repurposed for recreational use — the Kenilworth Trail opened in 1996 and quickly became one of the most popular biking and walking routes in the city.

Residential construction in CIDNA followed the same pattern as neighboring Kenwood and East Isles: homes went up in the 1910s and 1920s, designed for affluent families drawn to the lakes and the park system. The housing stock — Colonial Revivals, Tudors, Craftsman homes, and stucco two-stories — reflects the architectural tastes of that era. The neighborhood has remained stable and affluent ever since, with its character defined less by the homes themselves and more by the extraordinary natural setting that surrounds them.

Living in CIDNA feels like living inside a park system. The trails are not something you drive to — they are your commute, your morning run, your evening walk, your kid's bike route to school. Cedar Lake is visible through the trees from half the streets in the neighborhood. Lake of the Isles gleams from the other half. The soundscape is more birdsong than traffic. In autumn, when the maples and oaks along the Kenilworth corridor turn, the neighborhood becomes almost unreasonably beautiful — a corridor of gold and red that lasts for two weeks and draws cyclists from across the city.

The social character is private, established, and quiet. CIDNA has no commercial gathering place — no coffee shop, no restaurant, no corner store. Community connections form through the neighborhood association (CIDNA is one of the more active neighborhood organizations in Minneapolis), through school networks, and through the informal interactions that happen on the trails. The Kenilworth Trail is, in a sense, CIDNA's Main Street: the place where neighbors encounter each other, exchange greetings, and maintain the casual familiarity that substitutes for a commercial center.

The demographic profile is affluent, white, and highly educated — consistent with the broader lakeside Southwest Minneapolis pattern. Household incomes are well above the city median. Professional careers are disproportionately represented. The political orientation is progressive, with strong environmentalist leanings that are unsurprising given the neighborhood's relationship to its landscape. CIDNA residents tend to be deeply invested in park system governance, trail maintenance, and environmental policy — the issues that directly affect their daily experience of the neighborhood.

CIDNA has no commercial establishments within its boundaries — no restaurants, no cafes, no shops of any kind. This is the most extreme version of the purely residential character seen in several lakeside Southwest Minneapolis neighborhoods. All dining, shopping, and commercial activity happens in the surrounding neighborhoods, all of which are easily accessible by bike or short drive.

Outdoor recreation is not an amenity in CIDNA — it is the neighborhood. The ratio of parkland, lake, and trail to residential area is the highest of any neighborhood in Minneapolis, and the quality and connectivity of the outdoor spaces are exceptional by any national standard.

CIDNA is served by Kenwood Elementary School (K–5), a well-regarded neighborhood school with strong ratings and an active parent community. The school reflects the neighborhood's demographic profile: small, engaged, and well-resourced.

Middle school students typically attend Anthony or West Middle School. The high school is Southwest Senior High School, an International Baccalaureate World School with strong academics and an A-minus rating from Niche. Southwest's IB program draws students from across Southwest Minneapolis.

Private and independent school options include the Blake School, Breck School, and various Montessori and parochial programs accessible by car. The neighborhood's proximity to both Minneapolis and suburban school options gives families genuine choice, shaped by the financial resources that CIDNA households disproportionately possess.

Cedar - Isles - Dean is one of the more expensive neighborhoods in Minneapolis, with median home sale prices in 2025 ranging from approximately $600,000 to $950,000. The market is competitive but constrained by limited inventory — the neighborhood is small, the housing stock is mostly built out, and properties don't turn over frequently. Homes averaged about 16 days on market in 2025.

CIDNA's Walk Score of 65 is the lowest among the lakeside Southwest Minneapolis neighborhoods — a direct reflection of the absence of any commercial activity within the neighborhood. For walking to errands, CIDNA is genuinely inconvenient. For walking and biking for recreation, it is one of the best neighborhoods in the country.

The Bike Score of 95 is extraordinary — among the highest in Minneapolis. The Kenilworth Trail, the lake trails, and the connections to the broader Minneapolis bike network make cycling the dominant alternative to driving. Commuting to downtown by bike via the Kenilworth Trail takes approximately 20 minutes and is entirely car-free. Many CIDNA residents are committed cyclists who chose the neighborhood specifically for this infrastructure.

By car, downtown Minneapolis is 10–15 minutes via I-394 or Hennepin Avenue. The western suburbs are equally accessible via the same routes. MSP International Airport is approximately 20 minutes via Highway 62 or I-35W. Metro Transit bus service is available on Hennepin Avenue and Lake Street, at the neighborhood's edges. The planned Southwest LRT station at the Kenilworth Corridor would provide direct light rail service to downtown and the western suburbs — a transformative transit addition, if and when it is completed.

CIDNA's defining tension is between its extraordinary natural setting and the infrastructure decisions that threaten to alter it. The neighborhood is not in transition — it is in a prolonged negotiation over the terms of its own future.