Milton Lee OLIVE PARK

Grant Park Make Over, Revitalized State Street, Chicago Riverwalk, Navy Pier Plans, I wish the City would also focus on enhancing Olive Park which of late lacks landscaping maintenance and dreary water fountains that rarely work in season. >

NY Post columnits bashes Chicago

WINDY CITY'S NO CINDY CITY By CINDY ADAMS EXCUUUUSE me? I read in last week's paper that The Second City - Chicago - is now calling itself the Number One City in America. Chicago, that toddlin' town, The First City? Excuuuuse me? Take away Al Capone, the Merchandise Mart, O'Hare and Sinatra's favorite song and what have you got? A nice little gritty city that has decent beef, a few tolerable restaurants, some OK hotels, the stockyards and The Loop. But let us all calm ourselves . . . New York it's not. Chicago's population is a piddling, shriveled 2.7 million. Please. I mean, please! P. Diddy has more than that in his bed alone. What's it known for? Burglaries? OK, so New York's got them, too, but ours are bigger and better. Our guys who rob are top of the line. Take Dennis Koslowski of Tyco and $6,000 shower-curtain fame. Let's face it, this is no piker taker. And he's one of us. Who in that itty bitty Second City glommed onto the kind of money he did? Who they got in Chicago that comes near Dennis Koslowski? Who in that Midwestern cattle town ever threw a party where the statue's penis peed champagne? Nobody. Only Koslowski. Let's hear it for Koslowski. A true New Yorker. We are proud to call that big-time bum one of ours. We aren't into cockamamie criminals here. We got us the big daddies. OK, so you had a trial of the Chicago Seven. That was a good thing. But, hey, we had Jack Grubman a k a. the Wall Street meat. He had the rep of being "the worst analyst ever." Who they got in Chicago that comes near Grubman? They got maybe a Second Worst Analyst Ever? Grubman allegedly coughed up $1 million to some private school so his kid could get in. I mean, you people out there in the Windy City should stop blowing all this wind. We are the tops in everything. Chicagoans, get with it. You once had Wrigley, you once invented Crackerjacks, you once paraded hometowners Jane Addams and Upton Sinclair, you once had Mrs. O'Leary whose cow had a cow. But for right now, other than the freezingest coldest iciest lousiest weather anywhere, what are you the Number One in (other than the most flights a day to New York)? I don't say you're not nice people. You're very nice people. You've had some of the niftiest mayors money can buy. And nobody - not any single body - could ever beat Mayor Daley for popularity. Everybody was for Mayor Daley. Even dead people voted for him. So I'm not knocking your citizenry. But let's get real here. You just have to stop thinking you could ever beat the Big Apple. Just take the creativity of our politicians. Like when we had a bad traffic problem. One councilman came up with the solution: encourage car theft. Hey, you got to admit, nobody in your town came up with that one. Yeah, you were big enough and important enough to have a World's Fair. But, dear ones, dear sweet misguided Chicago persons, that was 1893. What have you done lately? We had us a World's Fair in 1939. Another in 1964. Your tourism group burbles about Ada's Famous Deli. Well, wowwee! Well, now, shut my pastrami. We got us the Stage, Carnegie, Katz's, PJ Bernstein and, until an hour ago The Second Avenue Deli. We got us as locals Regis and Rudy and Rosie, Katie and Conan, Julianne and Julia, Liza and Lizzie, Woody and Whoopi, Dustin and Derek. We got us Barbara and Diane and Matt and Sarah Jessica. We got Bloomberg and Bloomingdale's. We got Steinbrenner and Sharpton. We got Yanks, we got franks. You got Oprah. Art? You want to talk art? Picasso's "Garcon a la Pipe" was sold at Sotheby's. That's New York City. The record price was $104 million and some small change. Maybe some pitiful additional little dribble like maybe another hundred thou or so. You got what? Some cartoon from the Chicago Tribune? Zoo? You want to talk zoo. We got us the A-Number-One in the whole world Bronx Zoo. You know why? Because we know that in New York animals must be kept behind bars - for their own protection. Surveys prove we got us the largest number of rich people. Now if these billionaire folks were wealthy enough to buy wherever they liked and live wherever they liked, you'll notice they did not move to Chicago. I mean, you're a very nice little town and everything, you even have some nice little shops and everything - but, dear ones, what is wrong with you? You are not New York. Even folk in downtown Atlanta know that. Do you have New York cheesecake? New York sirloin? New York bagels? New York water? New York Post? New York attitude? Of course not. And that is why I am being so easy and gentle with you because I realize you are a deprived lot.>

Chicago skyline: heading for equal "awe" status?

This question is strictly about opinion, on how you see things. There is nothing right or wrong here, only differences in how visual impact affects each of us. I'm going to share how I "see" Chicago's evolving skyline and how I also see the other two great global skylines, NYC & HK, and how they compare. Chicago, more than the other two, has always counted on architectural quality rather than sheer volume it can not achieve in its ranking of being among the three great skylines of the world. That said, Chicago still has managed to transcend architecture to present a skyline that is pleasing to look at from all angles. Chicago has sufficent density of big buildings and has always been blessed by super tall's that puncuate this skyline, perhaps better than either Hong Kong or Manhattan. Looking at the three skylines today, in my characterization I see them this way: 1. Manhattan: the dominant thing here is the sheer mass of Midtown, an enormous "block" of steel and concrete that combines incredible density with notable height. It is unique. The block tends to be surprisingly flattened with neither the giant Empire State Bldg or the Chrysler Bldg able to "break away" from the whole. Manhattan is also visually blessed by the distance between the towers of midtown and Lower Manhattan, again an incomparable visual delight. Unfortunately, downtown Manhattan has been more "flattened" than midtown with boxy buildings that destroyed the delicate spire-type skyline of yore, a bygone gem perhaps more romantic than any other skyline in history. Manhattan's island status and wide rivers give it the most "Oz" like quality of the great skylines, a sense of arrival unparralled. 2. Hong Kong wows by how spread out the skyline is, spread out and high at the same time. It doesn't have the core of Midtown Manhattan, but compensates with more square mileage of real skyscraper heaven. Ironically HK's magnificent mountain-side site, while adding incredible beauty, detracts from the ability to see the skyline against...well....the sky. 3. Chicago uses attention to detail, magnificent architecture, and its core status within concentric rings to gain it status. In its own way, Chicago's may be the most centralized skyline in the world. Like HK and Manhattan, Chicago takes advantage of location: the contrast of soaring skyline against the flatness of an endless lake, the most canyonized river in the world. And, as stated before, the ability to "punctuate" the skyline with the likes of JHC, Sears, Aon. Now here is what is key: Chicago today can grab you with incredible beauty and plent of mass, but lacks some of Manhattan's and Hong Kong's "WOW" factor....which depends far less on beauty than it does on the ability to delightfully overwhelm. It is the over-the-top nature of both that works well for them. But what about today.....and tomorrow? Look at some of the structures that Chicago is building or will build. Trump and Waterview are under construction. Others with their type of height (or near it) are on the boards. So here is the real question (finally.....I'm as windy as the Windy City): WILL CHICAGO'S ABILITY TO "PUNCTUATE" ITS SKYLINE WITH INCREDIBLELY TALL BUILDINGS AND KEEP THE CONTRAST BETWEEN THE LOWER ONES THAT SURROUND THEM MAKE OUR SKYLINE AS "AWE INSPRING" TO YOU AS THE DIFFERENT APPROACHES OF NYC AND HK?>

Chicago Airport Congestion & Expansion Plans

Chicago's congested skies spur 'trench warfare' Runway crash fuels debate over new airport, expansion Judy Keen 9 February 2006 USA Today CHICAGO -- Debate about this city's airports has intensified since a Southwest Airlines jet skidded off a runway at Midway International Airport nine weeks ago, renewing questions about congestion and expansion and highlighting the role of politics in transportation planning. The accident, which killed a 6-year-old boy riding in a car and injured 10 people Dec. 8, is drawing renewed attention to the mile- square airport's limitations and location in the middle of a busy neighborhood. There also are questions about the future of O'Hare International Airport. Court challenges could delay a long-planned $6.6 billion expansion at O'Hare, which has been overtaken by Atlanta's Hartsfield-Jackson as the world's busiest airport. Last week, the Transportation Department said the two city-owned airports ranked last among 33 big U.S. airports for on-time departures in December. At O'Hare, 60% of flights left on time; 65% were on time at Midway. For decades, there has been talk about developing a new airport to take pressure off O'Hare and Midway. But two members of Congress are feuding over a proposed airport near Peotone in suburban Will County -- a project Chicago Mayor Richard Daley doesn't support. Adding to the uncertainty, the Gary Chicago International Airport in Indiana got $57.8 million in federal funds last month for an expansion its boosters say will make it the region's third major airport. The air travel outlook is a mess, says Joseph Schwieterman, an aviation specialist at DePaul University. "We've lacked the leadership to maintain our pre-eminence as America's premier airline hub," he says. "We put off critical decisions, and now we have trench warfare." A status report: *Midway: A $927 million project that included a new terminal was completed in 2004. About 18 million passengers used the airport in 2005. After the Midway accident in December, the Chicago Tribune reported that the city has been buying property near the airport, possibly for a "protection zone" at the end of the runway overshot by the jet. Airport spokeswoman Wendy Abrams says the property is for employee parking, not a safety perimeter. "We have no plans to undertake a massive land-acquisition program around Midway." Aviation consultant Mary Rose Loney says that during her tenure as Chicago's airport commissioner from 1996 to 2000, "it was always city policy that Midway would remain within its existing footprint." Recent upgrades at Midway "allowed us to put off critical capacity decisions for 10 years," Schwieterman says. But the landlocked airport can't grow unless the mayor takes the improbable step of bulldozing neighborhoods around it. That prospect, he says, "has never really been talked about." *O'Hare: Last year, the city got federal approval to begin work on a plan to reconfigure and expand O'Hare's intersecting runways. O'Hare was used by more than 76 million passengers in 2005. Some work has begun, but the plan includes the acquisition of 433 acres in neighboring communities of Des Plaines, Elk Grove Village and Bensenville, which would force about 200 businesses and more than 2,000 residents to relocate. Local officials have filed lawsuits in a bid to block the project. In December, a federal appeals court temporarily blocked Chicago from taking over St. Johannes Cemetery in Bensenville; a final ruling is pending. Another federal appeals court will hear arguments in April on opponents' challenge of the plan's cost-benefit analysis. "We're in the final battle," says Mayor Craig Johnson of Elk Grove Village. "It's David and Goliath." Some skeptics wonder whether the city can line up financing for the O'Hare project when major airlines are in financial trouble. "It will never happen," says Rick Bryant, a spokesman for U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., leader of a private effort to build a Will County airport. *Peotone: Jackson, Johnson and other opponents of O'Hare's expansion are the chief proponents of building in Will County. Discussions about an airport south of Chicago began in the 1960s. The state allocated $75 million for land acquisition near Peotone beginning in 2002. Jackson, whose congressional district is near the site, has secured $300 million in private financing and the support of Gov. Rod Blagojevich for a one-runway, five-gate airfield to be called Abraham Lincoln National Airport. Bryant says an airport near Peotone would be "an economic engine that will provide jobs." Jackson is at odds with U.S. Rep. Jerry Weller, a Republican whose district includes the site. Weller attached an amendment to a Pentagon spending bill that would give Will County control of the planning and ensure open bidding for construction contracts. Weller says the amendment would guarantee "transparency in the procurement process." Work on a "desperately needed" new airport, he says, could begin soon. Schwieterman says Peotone's airport "still has a real sense of momentum." But he says the absence of unanimity among its supporters "may deep-six it." *Gary: Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels said Gary's airfield will become "the next great Chicago airport" after using the federal funds for an $85 million plan to extend a runway, build passenger and cargo facilities and relocate railroad tracks. "Obviously, the feds have confidence in Gary's future," says Loney, the aviation consultant. Gary has had no commercial airline since Hooters Air suspended service in January, though it is home to charter and cargo flights and Boeing's corporate fleet. Airport director Paul Karas says the project will help lure new airlines. "We're sort of quiet out here, doing our thing," he says. "But we are ... going to be in a position to claim the title of third commercial airport for Chicago." Jay Franke, another former Chicago aviation commissioner, disagrees. He wonders if there will ever be a third significant airport here. "If a third airport were feasible in the Chicago region," he says, "Gary would already be commercially successful.">

Looptopia

http://www.suntimes.com/output/news/cst-nws-down04.html News Loop plans to stay up all night at special party February 4, 2006 BY SANDRA GUY Business Reporter Chicago's Loop will be transformed into an all-night party, with parades, fireworks and live performances in what boosters are billing as a multimillion-dollar extravaganza similar to Paris' White Nights Festival. The 12-hour event, called Looptopia, is slated for May 11, 2007, during Mother's Day weekend, said Ty Tabing, executive director of the Chicago Loop Alliance, in a speech to the alliance's first membership meeting and luncheon Friday at the Hyatt Regency Chicago. The event will be held from Wacker Drive to Congress Parkway and from Dearborn to Lake Michigan. Marshall Field's to stay open Looptopia planners envision an evening filled with shopping, dancing, parades, fireworks, concerts, night-clubbing and Cirque de Soleil-type performances, possibly ending with a sunrise concert at Millennium Park. Actors and dancers from downtown theaters and the Joffrey Ballet will participate in the festivities. Already, the Cultural Center has agreed to stay open all night that night; Marshall Field's -- to be renamed Macy's this fall -- has agreed to extend its hours until 2 a.m. for the event, and the Chicago Architecture Foundation will hold its first nighttime tours on dedicated CTA trains, Tabing said. Columbia College will hold the Manifest Urban Arts Festival the same evening, and the Chicago Park District will open an urban gardening exhibit at Butler Field. The Chicago Loop Alliance, a business group created last year from a merger of the Greater State Street Council and the Greater Michigan Avenue Association, has beefed up its efforts to find sponsors for Looptopia and similar events as part of its efforts to transform the Loop's gritty urban look into a funky delight. The alliance also will: *Post on its Web site (www.ChicagoLoopAlliance.com) by this spring audio tours of the Loop that people can download for free onto their iPods and MP3 players. The alliance will set up a site downtown where visitors and others can rent audio players with the audio tours installed. The project is funded by a $50,000 grant from the state. *Clean up an alley between State and Dearborn to create the Couch Place theater walkway, including two gateway arches that will connect the Goodman and Chicago theaters. The project is funded with $600,000 in city money. *Install a second mural in the Loop with the help of the School of the Art Institute. The first mural, "Loop Tattoo," is at 63 E. Lake St. sguy@suntimes.com>

All Chicago forumers must read this

At this point we have to ask you not to use any content coming from these sites: Don't copy any information, don't point to these, don't quote them, in fact it would be best not to even look at these sites at all. If you happen to stumble on one of your posts which might have content from either one of these sites, please help us out and edit it out. Some posts or threads might be missing because of this. Thanks all for your cooperation.>

Only in Chicago....

This thread is kind of dumb but think of some funny things that happen here. For instance: Only in Chicago: Do you wait for a bus for 30 minutes, and then five buses in a row come packed, which cause you to wait as you watch the five buses pass you by (I could be slightly exaggerating). You have all four seasons in one day. Ok thats all I could think of, help me out here, tell me what you have noticed.>