Tag Archives: Chicago

Locating the geographic center of Chicago

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A sign in the McKinley Park neighborhood supposedly marks the geographic center of Chicago. Just one problem: the center shifted several decades ago:

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In 1896, a Tribune article placed the city’s midpoint at West 37th and South Carlton. That address doesn’t exist today, but it’s pretty close to where the modern-day sign is. The discovery that the geographic center was essentially a cow pasture shocked the article’s writers…

The spot is no longer home to a pasture, but it’s still in a quiet, residential neighborhood about 5 miles from The Loop. Ald. Julia Ramirez (12th) said it’s special the sign is in a working-class neighborhood like McKinley Park…

But more than 20 years before outgoing Mayor Michael Bilandic presided over a 1979 ceremony declaring the intersection as the city’s geographic center, the city’s annexation of land for O’Hare International Airport had shifted the actual midpoint about 1.5 miles northwest. 

Now, the actual center is between Pilsen and McKinley Park: south of 31st and Western and in the water of the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, according to WBEZ Chicago. 

Two thoughts in response:

  1. Geographic centers get relatively little love compared to population centers or social influence centers. Where there is more social, economic, and government activity is likely to be seen as more “central” even if it is not geographically central.
  2. This provides a reminder of the dimensions of the city of Chicago. The geographic center is pulled to this location by the city stretching further to the south than the north.

How about a sign at the true geographic center as well as retaining the sign at the acknowledged geographic center? They could coexist and mark the unique boundaries of the city over time. Imagine a walking trail of geographic centers throughout Chicago’s history.

How does a story about a band’s tour bus dumping waste on a tourist boat enter a city’s “pop culture fabric”?

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On August 8, 2004, the driver of the tour bus for the Dave Matthews Band emptied the bathroom waste as they crossed over the Chicago River. The waste fell on passengers in a tourist boat passing below.

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Lots of things happen in big cities. Some stories are stranger or more influential than others. But how might one story get commemorated for years? Which cultural narratives last? One non-profit leader described this particular story:

“The incident is woven into the city’s pop culture fabric, and the anniversary seemed like an opportunity to emphasize that the world has to protect our natural resources, but it didn’t work out,” Frisbie said of the effort.

The article on the 20th anniversary provides some hints on how this story caught on and continues to be told. To go beyond a story that the people involved tell over and over, some help is needed:

-Famous people involved. The music group was well-known with multiple #1 platinum albums under their belt. This was not a random tour bus.

-Criminal charges and a court case. This involves different public bodies and can keep a story in the news.

-The media. A strange but true story – bathroom matters! a famous band! charges! – is a good one to get attention. And can we expect stories on the 25th anniversary, the 30th, and so on?

I am sure it would be hard to measure but it would be interesting to look at how this story stacks up against other stories in the city of Chicago. Which ones stand the test of time? Does this one make it into “official” lore (books, museums, memorials, etc.)? What is the half-life of pop culture stories in Chicago?

Commemorating the portage that led to the creation and flourishing of Chicago

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I recently visited the Chicago Portage National Historic Site in Lyons, Illinois. Here are some images from the site:

The importance of traveling via water meant that portage sites were important. This site was one of the places where it was easier to move watercraft from the Great Lakes system to the Mississippi River system. It was not the only portage site allowing that connection but it became known and then improved on in the mid-1800s with a canal.

The site now is somewhat obscured off a major local road and close to a major interstate. The area is mostly industrial land with few houses nearby. Chicago is a transportation center but a portage is no longer needed. There are still canal waterways nearby but these have receded in importance to and status in Chicago compared to railroads, highways, and airports. Chicago is still a transportation center but a portage is no longer needed.

The Chicago Portage Wikipedia page has lots of details.

Large wealth disparities in Chicago by race and ethnicity

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A new report shows differences in wealth and assets by race and ethnicity in Chicago:

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Disparities across groups are stark. According to the study, data collected in 2022 showed Chicago’s white families have the highest median net wealth ($210,000), while typical Black families report no wealth ($0). Chicago’s U.S.-born Mexican families have 19% ($40,500) of a typical white family’s wealth, while foreign-born Mexican families have 3% ($6,000) and Puerto Rican families have 11% ($24,000).

As for median asset values, Black families have $20,000, foreign-born Mexican families have $26,000 and white families have $325,500.

The study also found Black families had the lowest estimated rate of home ownership at 34%, while white families had the highest at 72%, reflecting the city’s historic discrimination against people of color through redlining, racial covenants, a lack of checking or savings accounts, and payday lending, where unsecured loans with high interest rates are used as emergency financing that keeps borrowers in a cycle of long-term debt.

The researchers asked people about possible interventions:

“The Color of Wealth in Chicago” study also surveyed people about potential policy proposals for addressing structural economic disparities. Data shows that public support for interventions on local and federal levels would have a meaningful impact on racial wealth inequities. Wealth-building options such as guaranteed income projects, a Medicare for All program, and baby bonds, which are government-issued trust accounts for newborns, garnered support from the bulk of respondents, including families at or above the median net worth.

Wealth matters because it affects all kinds of life chances, including where people live, access to education and medical care, and nearby jobs.

While these figures echo national patterns, Chicago (and the region) also has a particular history that contributed to these gaps. See a recent court settlement intended to help address public housing discrimination or efforts in nearby Evanston to provide reparations for housing or suburban discussions about who affordable housing is intended for. To assume that federal and/or state policies alone will address these disparities misses the potential to develop and harness local collective will and resources. Wasn’t this part of conversations about the legacy of former mayor Rahm Emanuel and whether his policies favored downtown or the whole city? Could the whole region come together to address these concerns (which are not just limited to the city of Chicago)? Wouldn’t addressing these disparities now help lead to a better future for more people?

Extended settlement to Gautreaux case addressing Chicago public housing discrimination

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Public housing discrimination has a long history in Chicago. The courts just granted an extension to the settlement to a 1966 case addressing the issue:

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The case, Gautreaux v. Chicago Housing Authority, was a class-action lawsuit brought on behalf of public housing resident and community organizer, Dorothy Gautreaux, and it sought to end systemic racial discrimination in Chicago’s public housing. The lawsuit alleged CHA discriminated by concentrating poor black residents in high-rises in segregated communities and not allowing them the opportunity to move into public housing communities in white neighborhoods. The case went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court, which sided with the residents and determined that they were being isolated to specific neighborhoods.

Attorneys for both sides negotiated a settlement in 2019, with CHA agreeing to continue developing scattered site housing and engage in discussions on how to improve the housing voucher mobility program. The settlement also called for CHA to provide a detailed schedule to complete mixed-income housing complexes, and create early learning childhood development programs at four existing public housing developments. The original settlement was to last for five years, and if CHA failed on its promises, it could return to court. 

Both CHA and the plaintiffs returned to court recently , as they agreed there were outstanding requirements to be met at six development projects, according to a joint motion filed with the court on Tuesday…

According to the new terms of the settlement agreement, CHA will have one to three years, depending on the project, to complete certain development plans, including for Altgeld Gardens, Lakefront Properties, Madden/Wells, Rockwell Gardens, Stateway Gardens and Robert Taylor Homes. Both parties did agree, however, that CHA had met its obligations to build public housing in areas outside segregated Black neighborhoods, so the housing authority will no longer be subject to court oversight for that part of the agreement.

In a country pretty opposed to public housing, I hope the extension leads to more housing opportunities.

This is also a reminder of the long legacies of housing discrimination and residential segregation. The kind of housing discrimination in public housing experienced in Chicago in the mid-twentieth century may not be legal now but it has effects nearly six decades later. And court orders and settlements may be the most direct ways to lead to change. (See also the Mount Laurel case in New Jersey) compared to legislation (see difficulties in Illinois and other states).

The most recent wave of Irish pubs in Chicago

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If early Irish pubs in Chicago functioned more like “social service agencies,” some of the more recent ones in the city have different roots:

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In 1986, Kitty O’Shea’s opened on the ground level of the Chicago Hilton with the mission of creating an “authentic Irish pub experience” in downtown Chicago. Its owners paid careful attention to detail, traveling to Dublin to research the look and feel of some of its treasured pubs. They flew in Irish bartenders with authentic brogues and offered nightly Irish entertainment. It quickly became the most successful Hilton hotel restaurant in the world, according to news reports…

Chief among them is the Irish Pub Concept, creators of the Fadó franchise. They offer consulting and resources for prospective pub owners, with several templates to choose from (including Celtic, English and country-style bars). The company says it helped launch upwards of 6,500 Irish pubs across the world. They provide everything — down to the brick-a-brack and employee training manuals.

These mass-produced Irish pubs have been criticized for offering a caricaturized, Disneyfied version of Irish culture — an Irish “pub in a box,” if you will. But they are also hugely popular.

Chicago still has its share of Irish pubs that grew organically and are owned and operated by Irish emigrants and their descendants. They include Shinnick’s Pub, which has been in Bridgeport for 80 years; Chief O’Neill’s, named in honor of an Irish-born Chicago police chief and opened by Irish emigrants in the ’90s; and the Fifth Province in the Irish-American Heritage Center. These places didn’t need to consult anyone on authenticity. And they continue to draw Irish emigrants, locals and people like me — the descendants of those early arrivals.

Presumably, some of these locations serve as “third places,” settings where people can go between work and home to socialize, eat, and talk. Sociologists and others have noted that Americans have relatively few places like this and this limits social interaction and civic engagement.

But other locations may serve more like consumer spaces where people visit, enjoy, and leave having had a good time. There are plenty of these in American communities where people seek out a particular experience they like with less concern for community-building and longer-term relationships.

Could online or virtual spaces ever replicate these settings? I am skeptical. Could online or virtual spaces drive people back to pubs and other gathering spots to converse and interact in person with other humans? Maybe.

From railroad easement to tax deduction during railroad merger to Millennium Park

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Where did the land for Chicago’s Millennium Park come from?

In 1993, I went to work with Forrest Claypool in the Chicago Park District. I was responsible for the lakefront district. It always made no sense to me that there was this muddy, ugly hole right off Michigan Avenue. It also made no sense that if the Illinois Central Railroad owned that land, they would use it as a surface parking lot. You would think they would do something else with it. The other thing that stood out was that there was one track on the eastern edge with a single boxcar on it. It was just an eyesore. For a century, city and parks groups would try to buy the land, and the railroad would never sell it…

I did a title search. I just wanted to get to the bottom of it. I was sort of a zealot about the use of public land. I found out that the railroad didn’t own the land after all. It was always the city’s land. What the railroad had was an easement. So they could use the land for rail purposes, but they couldn’t build a building. They had no air rights. And to maintain the fiction of rail purposes, they kept the single track and the single boxcar. The railroad was happy to make some ancillary revenue as a parking operation. At this point, Forrest and I advised the mayor of what we had found. And [in 1996] the park district and the city Law Department together sued the railroad.

Without Randy Mehrberg’s discovery, none of this happens. Daley was in action mode almost immediately. As in: “Let’s go through the legal process here to get this thing done.” It was not until this sort of virgin land in the middle of the city became available that he saw that this was the chance.

The railroad was not terribly happy or receptive. But a funny thing happened: The Illinois Central was in the process of being sold to the Canadian National Railway. And I suggested to the railroad that instead of litigating with us, they make a donation to the city of all of their title and interest rights from Randolph Street to McCormick Place. They would get a nice tax deduction, and it would enhance their merger, because the purchase price was based on a multiple of earnings, and a large tax deduction would improve their earnings. We were able to negotiate that.

The area around the Chicago River and the lakefront was a shipping area with railroads converging and boats coming in and out. Yet, it sounds like it took a while to figure out what to do with all this space once transportation activity moved elsewhere. It is not as if Chicago stopped being a transportation center; the action shifted and this area eventually became a park.

Having been in Millennium Park many times, I do not recall seeing any documentation of the previous history of the land. If it is not marked, why not tell some of the story of railroads and other lakefront uses in the past to what the park is today? I am in favor of more resources for residents and visitors to learn and visualize what used to be where they are standing or looking. (Some of this could come from virtual reality or augmented reality devices but we are not there yet.)

The cultural contributions of Chicago right now

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In an editorial, the Chicago Tribune highlights current cultural contributions from the city in which they operate:

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Flyover is a fabulous new $40 million attraction at Navy Pier that used sophisticated drones to create an experience landing somewhere between an IMAX movie and a virtual roller-coaster. It makes you feel l as if you are flying like a bird over Sweet Home Chicago and thus experiencing it anew. The ride-movie hybrid, created here by Pursuit, part of the Arizona-based Viad Corp., has been doing boffo business and was just added to the lineup at the company’s Las Vegas operation. That means international tourists headed to Sin City now can visit Chicago, at least virtually. The beauty of Chicago also is coming to Flyovers in Vancouver and Reykjavík, Iceland, where we’ll bet they don’t take our city’s grandeur for granted as so many of us do here.

“The Bear” has been tantalizing neighborhoods all over the city as it has filmed its third season. This Hulu show, in many ways a love letter to Chicago and its innovative artists and hospitality workers, is approaching a tipping point of popularity. If it retains its quality, which seems like a good bet, it will bring yet more attention to the city and maybe even spark the kind of spin-off tourist appeal that shows such as “Friends” and “Sex in the City” have brought to New York City for years.

Chicago is all over Broadway, too, right now. One of the surprise hits of the Broadway season, “The Heart of Rock and Roll,” a droll jukebox musical featuring the songs of Huey Lewis and the News, is set almost entirely at Chicago’s venerable Drake Hotel during the 1980s. That’s thanks to a writer, Jonathan A. Abrams, who grew up in the north suburbs and has peppered his show with accurate local references from Dick Butkus on down. “Illinoise,” which began at Chicago Shakespeare Theater and moved to Broadway, has its audiences staring at the word “Chicago” on its backdrop for the entire show. Plenty of them are posting it on social media.

Add to that the coming Democratic National Convention and the attendant media exposure, and Chicago will be making a lot of news this summer and well beyond.

An interesting collection to highlight: a tourist attraction, a television show, theater productions, and a political convention.

Chicago is, of course, a world class global city. Figuring out what cities rank highly includes culture, among other factors. In the United States, Chicago lags behind New York and Los Angeles in terms of population and prestige and there are cities coming up behind it (Toronto? Houston?). How much influential culture needs to occur and/or be noticed in Chicago?

Setting The Matrix in Chicago – sort of

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While recently rewatching The Matrix, I noticed multiple references to Chicago streets. And then there is a map in the second half of the film:

Looking closely, this is not exactly Chicago. But, the waterfront kind of looks like Chicago, there is a neighborhood on the map marked “City Loop,” the city has a river, and things do appear to converge in the district next to the waterfront.

Why the resemblance? One source suggests this is deliberate in the depiction of Mega City:

Early drafts of the screenplay identified the city as Chicago, and most of the street and landmark names referenced in the films are from Chicago,[4] such as Wabash and Lake, Franklin and Erie, State Street, Balbo Drive, Cumberland Ave, the Adams Street Bridge and the Loop Train.[5] Some street names, such as Paterson Pass and Wu Ping Ave., are derived from names of production staff.

In a brief screenshot of the first movie, wherein Tank zooms in a map on the screen to give Cypher directions to the telephone, the map of the city shows a coastline similar to that of Chicago’s Lake Michigan Coastline.

The creators have connections to Chicago:

Sure, most of the trilogy’s urban scenes were shot in Sydney, and close watchers of the first movie can spot several Sydney landmark buildings. But creators Larry and Andy Wachowski were raised in Chicago and drop at least five references in the first script…

The Wachowskis attended Whitney Young High School and spent two years in small liberal arts colleges before they each dropped out and started a construction business. Then the quirky film resume began to take shape.

This is not unusual in today’s filming of movies and shows: creators are from certain places, scenes may be shot in a variety of places, and the name of the place in the film or show may or may not align with the places that are depicted on screen. In The Matrix, a combination of modern cities produce a soulless but recognizable setting.

Chicago as a laboratory – for residential segregation?

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A quote discussing a new documentary about residential segregation in Chicago reminded me of imagery used by sociologist Robert Park about seeing a city as a laboratory for study:

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“This documentary really shows that Chicago is not just a place where segregation happened, but in some ways the intellectual and bureaucratic headquarters for thinking about how to carry it out,” Brown said. “It was a real brain trust in Chicago starting at the very turn of the 20th century, thinking about the problems that Blacks posed for real estate values and coming up with different ways of thinking about that as salesmen from the realtor point of view, as an intellectual problem being studied at UChicago, and the way the different neighborhood associations were also trying out different ways of keeping Blacks out of their neighborhoods.”

In other words, at official, neighborhood, and organizational levels, Chicago worked out how to practice residential segregation. Over the years, Chicago has ranked high on measures of residential segregation. A quick visual of the situation – such as a dot map showing race and ethnicity of residents – shows the differences in residences in Chicago today. And did other places follow the lead of Chicago?

I look forward to seeing this documentary.