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Originally Posted by 2PRUROCKS!
A definite no to any hotel east of LSD...but the rest of the plan sounds doable. Of course the devil is in the details and we need to see the rendering and plans.
The 1 billion for infrastructure improvements is probably needed as is for proper access to the Museum Campus, Northerly Island, McCormick Place, Burnham Harbor, and current Soldier Field. This is just doing what should have been done already.
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The city should have done all that 25 years ago during the major LSD rerouting. While not perfect, the Museum Campus looks pretty darn nice. Other than finally making Northerly Island useful, I see little improvement that needs to happen there. A billion dollars would be much better used to beautify and improve the lakefront elsewhere.
What, are they going to bury LSD and the IC tracks? All so the Bears could put a $2 billion stadium on the lakefront, which will be on an extremely tight parcel and shouldn't be there anyway. A site that will likely lack in any tailgating and little in the way of dining or retail options right near the stadium. It is amazing how officials in this city promote just throwing hundreds of millions of dollars down the drain for no real identifiable reason.
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Another site like Michael Reese or the 78 have even more infrastructure needs and just as bad if not worse transit connections. Michael Reese for example is even further from downtown and most rail lines and highway access is just as challenging
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The Michael Reese site needs a real road network from 31st street to 55, but that would be much cheaper than the 1 billion we are discussing here, and is part of the city's long term plans to develop the site anyway.
The site sits right on top of the IC tracks. The MCC busway stops literally right at the site's door at the south end of MCC. The I-55 feeder ramps are right there. There are already thousands of MCC parking spots adjacent to the location.
Let's be real here. This is just some weird stubborn vanity play by the Bears, who have always fixated on being ON the lakefront if they were to be in Chicago. They mucked up the SF redevelopment plans, at great taxpayer expense, the first time, and they seem to have learned nothing since then.