I read that AP story and was equally confused.

My comment isn't necessarily going to be about home brewing. For a (currently mothballed) novel I've worked on set temporally just prior to and after WWI and geographically in Duluth and the Texas Hill Country, I did a fair amount of research into the state of beer brewing and distribution in that era, and the small-scale breweries that served up beer back then offered definitively regional inflections of suds preferences. Seems like, with possible commercial basement brewing and the proliferation of brewpubs, we are getting "back to the future" on this front. 

Similar stuff seems to be happening with food, possibly energy and other areas of concern collected together under the banner of "relocalization." 

(Although yesterday in the co-op I saw a family shopping and when the adult female of the family held up a chunk of cheese to the adult male of the family and said, "Should we buy this one instead, it's more local?" The adult male said, "I don't give a shit about local," and prompted the woman to toss said cheese back into the cooler.) 

Sorry, Paul, I seem to have talked my way off into a threadjack.

Davids:  I think you're right with the "back to the future" notion.  

The complete and utter failure of a program known as Prohibition ruined what was a great beer culture in this country. It paved way for big corporations to start buying up the little guys (or at least, the few that made it through Prohibition) to get a hold on the beer market.

However, more and more people are finding craft beer, and some people are finding homebrewing.  Some of those people go on to start brewpubs or work in breweries, or they start to research old styles that have long died off.  

I'm happy to see more brewpubs / breweries around the city open up... hopefully their beer quality is a lot better than a certain other brewpub around the twin ports.

The article is crap. Almost every brewing industry article I read in mainstream media is misleading or flat out wrong. 

Here's the thread from mnnbeer.com.

I sampled Carmody's beer, it was good

Had three of the beers at Carmody, two were decent to good, but I didn't like the Potato (I think it was) Stout at all.

I read the article in the paper and laughed at the way in which it was written, the law has nothing to do with home brewing as far as I can tell. I don't brew in my basement (it's too cold for ales), I find the upstairs hallway is a more sustainable and proper temperature for fermentation. Although if they made storing beer in your basement illegal I'd be in trouble, the 45 degrees in the winter eliminates the need for a beer fridge.

Flateric, it seems like what you are asking is: "if everything was equal would you drive further for the same thing?" (I'm not being snarky I swear.)

Overall I would say in general I would drive the least amount of distance possible for decent food and good beer. Then sometimes drive longer distances to try the slightly different thing. If a brewpub in Superior offered something markedly better or something distinctly different I'd be more apt to visit more often for that specifically.

Taxi to and fro runs ~$40 with tip.

edgeways:  tis a good point.  I didn't want to specifically say that one place in Superior would be better than one place in Duluth (as everyone has different tastes)... but I was hoping to make it a fair-and-balanced question.

I guess what I should've asked is if Superior had a brewpub with some distinct differences (e.g. better food or better beer)... would people be willing to make the trek?  

I can understand why not with $40 taxi fares and pretty much no bus service.