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July 18, 2017

Hastert released from prison in Minnesota

I always thought it would be cool if they used those tracks for some transit down carroll ave and up over goose island to north ave.

The rail line itself is inactive, but the right-of-way is still owned by the railroad.

Unfortunately, we've spent millions on useless studies since 1980 because people saw "railroad track" and thought "transit corridor."

Transit should go where it's useful, not where there's cheap right of way.

I think it would be easier to simply encourage private development around a cheap ROW, then develop the transit, then to wait 2 centuries and 48 environmental studies and 39 presidential administrations for a single transit line to be built using federal money in an established corridor.

Chicago will build a new rail line to service these densifying downtown areas probably long after my great great great great great great great grandkids have passed, the earth is 30 degrees warmer, half of North America is underwater, and we now have a colony (with its own casino) on Mars.

Forget it. Any dream to build new transit is a joke. Obtaining funding ain't gonna happen, our priorities are elsewhere, the car won, we lost, and its best to just enjoy what we have and drink beer and eat pizza.

^Or we could, you know, only allow development where there's already transit.

Almost like we had some sort of city planning.

How do we build a city if we only build things where infrastructure exists?

What about new infrastructure investments? Once upon a time we actually did build train lines, sometimes out into prairies. It's how Chicago got built after all.

The Bronx only took off after they extended the subway there. They literally extended subways into fields and sparse towns, and the Bronx went crazy after that. That IS urban planning.

Yeah, that's true. My 2nd great grandfather was an early land/property investor in the Bronx (also owned a bunch of properties in Manhattan) and actually sued the MTA (whatever it was called back then) to stop the 3rd Avenue Elevated from building a stop near where his main residence was. He definitely did not win that - but it's sad because none of these neighborhoods are there anymore and the 3rd Avenue Elevated was torn down awhile ago. Now it's a bunch of housing projects around there. I have a transaction record from the NY Times of him buying 10 lots of land back in the day - housing projects today. Actually the history of the Bronx is pretty interesting. I have seen pictures before and after this and it's pretty crazy. When my ancestors moved from Manhattan to the Bronx, it was definitely more suburban and even country. We have an article about my 2nd great grandfather talking about how when he invested it was mostly "cow pastures" - pretty funny. Back in the day some parts attracted some decently well off people who were tired of living in Manhattan (kind of like how Brooklyn sprouted up).

Those were private companies that built out into The Bronx and Westchester—and Niles Center and Westchester, for that matter—not cash-strapped public agencies who already have too many stations at which no one boards.

You want to spend public money to allow developers to profit from turning Goose Island residential? First do what you can to get some density around Green and Pink Line stations.

That will be quite a useful line one day - for rail. 300 N LaSalle is cantilevered out over it to preserve the ROW, 310 N Clark will be as well. Of course it's primary use is for Valet Parking.

As a Garfield Park resident I 100% agree. It's the main driver that caused me to move here. Between California, Kedzie, and the Conservatory stop there remains a wealth of TOD development opportunity. The city should be doing everything it can to encourage development and make use of this amazing existing infrastructure before even considering a major expansion. Once someone who earns the median income can no longer afford to live near any CTA train station, then it's time to talk about expansion. IMHO.

Ya, East Garfield. 6 train stations, 6 train lines. Half of it is zoned RM-5 or B3-3. 20% of the buildable land is vacant.
But the city wants to give developers cookies for building in Lincoln Park.

We already have a city, we're not creating a new city. We're not the Chicago of 1890. We have a great number of neighborhoods that collapsed during the city-to-suburbs inversion of the post 1950 era. We need to revive the use of lines and stations that were once vibrant and cost next to nothing to maintain compared to building new lines. The City should absolutely be using both carrot and stick to build dense infill near existing stations. The TOD ordinance is a great start, but more can be done. I advocate encouraging increased density in Lincoln Park near rail stations because that's where people want to live, so the City should accommodate that. But I also advocate the City pushing for density near places along the Green and Pink lines so that that underutilized infrastructure can be made more economically self-sustaining.

But the City should also be identifying and preserving future routes to forget enhance transit in the core of the City. Then, as the footprint of the "desirable City" expands and begins to accelerate self-sustaining, organic growth, and as farebox revenues increase at existing stations, the City can better sell the idea of new lines to relieve existing congestion.

I do think there are two routes that should be in planning now, though: the Clinton subway, and some sort of West Loop to Streeterville line. For the latter, I still think the Monroe subway is the better option for truly mass transit, but a BRT solution using fully built out West Loop Transportation Center and Carroll Street, and a push to create a bus-only Lower Michigan all the way to LSD would be excellent projects.

Additionally, the developers of the 78 and Riverside should be engaged to identify cost-effective ways to have mass transit near the east bank of the river.

Goose Island and the North Branch projects need to have some ROW identified and preserved, but infilling existing needs is and should be the priority first.

East Garfield Park, as well as Austin, should definitely be pushed to be as dense as possible within the TOD distances of it's many existing rail stations. That would do a lot to increase fare revenue for the CTA and help make expansion viable. It would also help slowly squeeze the crime out of the West Side. Which would benefit the entire city.

It is not a matter of "squeeze the crime out" - it is a question of move the residents out - remove the culture where everyone (not just gang bangers) is hanging out on the front stoops at 2am. A culture where the police are the enemy and Robbin hood is not just a fairy tail.

If your solution is just "move the residents out", then you acknowledge that there is no hope for these people. I don't believe that type of defeatist attitude gets anybody anywhere. Have you ever asked one of these residents why they might view police as the enemy? Read up on Fred Hampton, Laquan McDonald or Jon Burge for a refresher. Maybe they are upset that hundreds of millions are used to pay police misconduct penalties instead of improving schools or roads in their neighborhood. The culture of blaming the people left in these neglected neighborhoods isn't very admirable itself.

From Crain's

I am more than a little familiar with the West Side, having formed Commie cells there and taught adult reading using the Little Red Book. That doesn't change the fact that if you can't do an Uptown type of gentrification here, like Cabrini are Robert Taylor the only "solution" is to clear out the community and start fresh.

Turing Aurora, Joliet, and Milwaukee into collar slums is the current long range plan.

For a comprehensive solution to societies ills http://revcom.us - until then we need to figure out how to deal with what we have.

I wasn't blaming all residents, nor was I advocating forcing out everyone currently living there.

But to the extent that current residents are reluctant to work with the police to identify and arrest local criminals - which I recognize is due to a wide range of complex reasons - as new residents move in, residents that may arrive with a different attitude toward the police, there will be increased pressure on criminals in the area who may, in turn, start to choose other areas in which to base their operations.

If this is coupled with helping existing upstanding residents to buy into the neighborhood so that as many as possible can benefit from gentrification, it can be win-win. If existing residents are helped to buy their homes, then when gentrification raises property values they stand to benefit. Some may still end up priced out, but if the City invests good training and other assistance to ensure existing homeowners don't lose their equity even if increasing property tax costs force them out, and makes sure senior residents are able to take advantage of property tax freezes to allow at least a good chunk of them to remain, then you have a win-win-win.

The City wins by having another swath of the City with increasing property tax revenues and lower crime, developers win by profiting from gentrification, and pre-existing residents win by either being helped to remain to enjoy improved neighborhood infrastructure and/or a bump in wealth from the ownership of their own homes even if they have to (or simply choose to) move out.

I think gentrification would be much less controversial if the City invested some efforts in teaching existing residents how to a) benefit from gentrification directly, or b) make choices that mitigate negative aspects of gentrification on them personally. There will always be a few unlucky people who are hurt by change, both through poor choices and through no fault of their own. But if the City actively tried to minimize people hurt by change and increase the percentage of people who benefit from change, there would hopefully be less resistance and gentrification might happen faster and even help even out some of the wealth disparity in the city.

Gentrification would be much less of a problem if property taxes for existing homes didn't double every time a tear-down rebuild occurs or an empty lot gets a new building.
Just because my neighbor cashes out and someone with more money moves in doesn't mean I get a raise and can suddenly afford to pay hundreds more a month in taxes.

It's government that is pricing people out of gentrifying neighborhoods, not developers. And it's wrong to say that a neighborhood has to remain depressed and crumbling as the only way to keep it affordable, because that's the only way government will keep the taxes low.

Maybe that's why we see South side politicians putting zoning freezes on major arterials? If the city is going to say "there's a micro brewery and trendy Thai fusion restaurant around the corner from you, you must be rich and can pay double", then the only solution is to keep new businesses out of the area.

I hope you would say the same thing about the GI Bill, a governmental transfer of wealth that helped build the great American middle class. The over-the-top libertarian bent of this board is a little too much sometimes. (Unless we are talking about a parking podium or ugly design, then this board is all about government intervention, but that is a topic for another day.)

The lack of affordable housing is a problem across the United States, not specific to Chicago. Maybe it is possible that the "market" has failed; we should at least entertain the possibility. Wages are not rising, and have not risen in 20 years, for middle-income earners. Little inventory was built from 2010 to 2015, so rents have increased due to low supply. Stagnant income plus increased housing costs gives us the problem we see today.

There are plenty of affordable housing options in Chicago. It's just that they are not 'trendy neighborhoods'. Instead they are blue collar hoods such as Clearing, Garfield Ridge, Hegewisch, etc.