Category: Chicago

Design and features of six Bloomingdale Trail access parks are formulated in a single night

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Participants at Tuesday evening’s access parks charrette. Most photos by John. 

In 2015, when the Bloomingdale Trail and parks are complete, no one should be able to say that a feature or two isn’t supposed to be there. In a public planning process that continues to impress, with unprecedented, widespread community involvement, a new step was completed on Monday and Tuesday with the release of the framework plan and a trail access and park charrette, respectively. The residents of Chicago have designed this trail and its accompanying access parks by providing feedback probably totaling several million words. This is a process where votes are cast by showing up and participating; homeowners concerned about privacy met directly with members of the design team, and meeting participants stressing their concerns over people bicycling too fast were among the voters.

The design team, which consists of the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT), Trust for Public Land (TPL), the Friends of the Bloomingdale Trail, and TPL and the Park District’s many contractors, held an access park charrette on Tuesday, May 15, 2012, at the Humboldt Park Fieldhouse. Continue reading Design and features of six Bloomingdale Trail access parks are formulated in a single night

Can bike shop deserts be eradicated on Chicago’s South Side?

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Johnny and John Stallworth at John’s Hardware & Bicycle Shop.

[This piece also runs in Urban Velo magazine.]

Pedaling down Halsted Street into Chicago’s Englewood neighborhood, I smell the unmistakable aroma of Harold’s Chicken as I pass an outpost of the South Side chain whose logo features a chef chasing a rooster with a hatchet. After an SUV speeds by me booming hip-hop, I pull up to John’s Hardware & Bicycle Shop, 7350 S. Halsted, and admire the old-fashioned, hand-painted sign, featuring John Stallworth’s smiling, bearded face and his no-nonsense slogan, “If we don’t have it you don’t need it.”

Continue reading Can bike shop deserts be eradicated on Chicago’s South Side?

Comment of the day: Even though city may be divided, it’s time to embrace good changes

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Photo of a man riding a bike by Drew Baker, found in the Grid Chicago Flickr group. 

I prefer to see comments like this in my inbox. This comment was posted by “flashabc” on John’s article, Bike facilities don’t have to be the white lanes of gentrification, regarding new bike lanes on Division Street in Humboldt Park:

I ride my bike everywhere in the city from Logan thru Wicker and Into Pilsen. I document the murals and have painted a few myself. I am Puerto Rican that was born in Humboldt and raised in Logan. It is time for the “My Community” to embrace the changes and the good that comes with generation that is growing in and around Humboldt. This city was very divided as i grew up in these neighborhoods. Its just the way it is. But know for the first time in my 45 years i can ride a bike in the middle of the night on Milwaukee Ave. This is only because of the bike movement of the past few years. People working together is the only way this city will ever go foward. It is time for the Humboldt Park community to grow with the rest of the communities around it and not fall into the old fashion hate that has encircled it.

Thank you for your comment.

Elston Avenue bike lane returns in upgraded form

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Riding in the cycle track southbound towards the Magnolia Avenue “Y”. 

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Riding in the cycle track southbound next to Elston Materials’s property. The parking space and wide area in this photo are for a tanker truck as seen in this photo. 

After seven months without them because of neighbor and weather delays, pavement markings make their return today to Elston Avenue between North Avenue and Magnolia Avenue. The difference now is that buffered bike lanes and a cycle track replace last year’s conventional bike lane. The full project limits are North Avenue to Milwaukee Avenue, a distance of 1 mile. The enhanced bikeway should definitely bring cyclists back to Elston Avenue, after what I perceived was a period of avoidance. A cycle track at the “Y” intersection of Elston and Magnolia Avenues should reduce the incidence of high-speed, northbound passes.

At 12:42 PM today, only sections between North Avenue and Magnolia Avenue had been striped.  Continue reading Elston Avenue bike lane returns in upgraded form

Grid Shots: Commercial statements

To get this Grid Shots going, I searched our Flickr group for “advertisement” and found only one photo. So I started at the end (the most recent photos) and browsed 10 pages to find this selection of “commercial statements” on our streets. Next week’s topic is “wayfinding”; submit your photos to our group and tag them with “wayfinding”.

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A message to those waiting for the 22/Clark bus in Andersonville at Clark Street and Bryn Mawr avenue says they cannot wait inside the Subway sandwich shop. Photo by Brian Morrissey. Continue reading Grid Shots: Commercial statements

Summary of transportation and transit changes because of NATO summit

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The Lakefront Trail will be closed from Balbo Drive to 31st Street. 

The upcoming NATO summit will greatly alter how people travel in the Loop, South Loop, Museum Campus, and Bronzeville areas May 19, 20, and 21 (Saturday to Monday). Travel on the Kennedy, Dan Ryan, and Stevenson Expressways will be affected. Transit agencies and other news sources have posted all the relevant information, linked on this page. If you are traveling to these areas, or normally travel through these areas, spend time reviewing the below webpages. This post will be updated as information changes.

How will these changes affect you? Continue reading Summary of transportation and transit changes because of NATO summit