CHICAGO | Obama Presidential Library

[sentinel]

Originally Posted by galleyfox

Well, the public trust doctrine was never intended for the "spirit of designated preservation".

It's meant to protect public ownership and access, which doesn't necessarily have to be in the form of a nature park.

If Chicago wanted to bulldoze a natural beach for a giant nonprofit industrial theme park on the lakefront, that is well within the city's prerogative. That *IS* the origin of Jackson Park after all. Not that the replaced section of Jackson Park was comparable to a natural beach. An open lawn between two major roads of speeding cars is more of a negative space, a nonspace, in my opinion.

The museum building and property still belong to Chicago, and the Obamas are legally leasing an exhibition space. At the end of the lease, Chicago is free to change the exhibition or to keep the existing one like any other lakefront museum.

As for parks being earmarked for elite display. .. that's most of the world's spectacular tourist sites and gardens. Grandeur and ego rarely come from the public.

Thank you for this.

The Lucas Museum was very similar, the city would lease the land, while the Lucas Foundation was to spend their money (no taxpayer money, mind you) to build the structure. Along with 12 acres of park space. But people said 'it's a dumb star wars museum', or 'an art museum doesn't belong in the MUSEUM campus', or 'it doesn't belong in Chicago, it's not relevant because it's entertainment-based', etc, etc, etc. A 'world-class' city saying 'NO' to something because they had a well-funded non-profit with too much power butting in and saying 'we don't want anything built on this asphalt parking lot that's used 4 months out of the year, because there COULD be a park built there in the future', even though a literal park was planned along with the museum. Now, 12 years later, a museum is opening imminently in LA, along with a $1 billion charitable foundation. Chicago has a parking lot.
(Yes, I'm venting, and yes, it's relevant to this discussion; no one should ever forget the massive fumble that Chicago made because Friends of The Park decided they knew better than everyone else).