inertia and A lack of imagination/old school thinking.

"hey, we already make plenty of money off of those parking lots and they give our customers a convenient place to park."

Rocky might be able to be talked into thinking more creatively about them, but Stupid Fucking Reinsdorf is the stickiest stick in the mud that ever got stuck in mud.

We might have to wait until that idiot kicks the bucket (he's 85).


at the very least, they are no doubt sitting out on untold millions of dollars by not building structured parking decks on some of the land and then selling off the rest to developers who would LOVE to cash in on the near west side's ever expanding boom.

This is poetry.

I feel like a broken record, every time this comes up. It's not our responsibility to chase after a private development like United Center with an expensive L station. It's our responsibility to not let such traffic generators be built where there's no good transit.

And yet . . . we told Lincoln Yards to go right ahead, essentially on the basis of their PowerPoint having a picture of a light rail train in it.

I agree that we should not be chasing private development that will require large amounts of public funds, such as Lincoln Yards. However, we are not talking about building a new transit line from scratch. We are talking about building a single station in one of the fastest growing central neighborhoods in any major US city.

Specifically, this station would be close to Malcolm X College, multiple public schools, serve public housing residents who have long been denied good transit, and several hospitals and medical facilities. To top it all off, the city's fastest growing employment center (Fulton Market) and the NBA's largest stadium which holds multiple events a week (United Center) would be right next door. Even ignoring the redevelopment possibilities, this station would be a good and sound investment for the CTA

Additionally, this would not be an example of "chasing after a private development".

When Chicago Stadium was built nearly a century ago, there freaking was a stop at Madison on the Paulina connector. A perfect example of placing a major traffic generator near transit.

Then the Paulina connector was taken out of revenue service for like 6 decades and the Madison station was removed.

This isn't chasing, it's restoring.

After 7 decades of severe and unrelenting kicks to the city's urban nuts, I understand where the defeatist attitude of the naysayers comes from.

But I'll still choose urban restoration every time.

We can do better.

We should do better.

Seen some construction workers and vehicles surrounding the area by the future damen green line stop today. Looks like its getting started

Not sure if they're actually starting to build or just potholing, but I also noticed this the other day. It's about time after years of delay that the city refuses to explain...

The fenced area in back with a (soil test? just a stack of steel beams?) has been there for a long time, but the heavy equipment in the foreground is new.

The lot behind the L structure across Lake is slated to be a maintenance facility for Rivian. Awesome TOD, City of Chicago... great job. :facepalm: At least there should be a proper midrise/affordable housing going up in Westhaven Park at the SE corner.

https://i.ibb.co/2YKbN4c/IMG-2910.png

Is the area north of that even zoned for residential? That entire area is industrial right now.

Yes, that's the problem

to answer this question, think about why the giants didn't do it until now.

Well they've only been in the neighborhood since 2000, and I think it required about a decade of planning, and then going through a lengthy proposal and approval process. I'm not sure if they selected this site from the very beginning with these intentions, or if they decided about 10 years into it to develop Mission Rock. Regardless, I think ultimately they saw a lot of empty land that was largely unused aside from game days and saw the potential for a new and vibrant neighborhood in its place.

I believe in the bigger picture, it made sense for the massive Mission Bay development to be a priority. That has been happening for many years. Mission Rock could be viewed like a later phase of the development of the larger area. I don't know if much of the process around there has any parallels to anything not happening at UC. There is also pressure to get more housing stock built in SF.

Only a matter of time, they already relaxed the industrial zoning between Ashland and Ogden. Ashland to damen probably next.

Nice industrial building stock. It’ll quickly transform to a smaller Fulton-esque neighborhood.

They should build a western stop as well. Then, FINALLY we may see the east Garfield park rebirth.

The upcoming Peterson/Ridge Metra station got new construction building permits yesterday. I believe they had their groundbreaking sometime in the fall.

Isn't this the metra station with the massive surface parking lot? I understand its commuter rail, but jeez just build a parking garage or something.

Looks like the 31 and 157 extension are now permanent.

Project link

There is no room for a massive parking lot. Site prep has been underway for months. They have carved into the slope embankment on the north and south sides of Peterson. That embankment will be reinforced with a vertical retaining wall leaving room for some head in parking spots on the south side as well as a pedestrian stairway. Any parking on the south side is linear and carved out of the old embankment, it is not a buildable surface lot.

On the north will be the main station with ramp and stairwell and elevator access and a drop off circle. Looks like the west side of tracks -will have another pedestrian ramp and stairs on the north side and a stairwell on the south. So pedestrian access on all 4 corners of the Peterson Ravenswood intersection and pedestrian above grade access to platforms from the south. Looks like 6 standard parking spots and 5 handicapped near the turnaround on the north side. Peterson bus will have stops right at the station. Divvy station at the Ridge Ave side(north). It may be slow but it is a good project.

The parking spots are labeled "kiss and ride" so I'm guessing they will be 30-minute time limited, not park-and-ride. This (more or less) is how the little parking lot at Clybourn works.

I agree with goatman though, this is not really very urban-friendly. That area could have been a proper plaza and pedestrian-focused space, instead 90% of it is for auto use and pedestrians just get the crumbs left over. This already in an area surrounded by auto sewers and dangerous intersections.

"slow" is an understatement.

when my wife and i bought our 1st condo in the 1400 block of west elmdale, i distinctly remember the seller's agent emphaszing "and with the new metra station that will be opening up soon over at peterson, this neighborhood will become the next ravenswood with a 15 minute train ride to the loop".

that was 8 years ago now.

good thing the metra station wasn't a deciding factor for us (though i wouldn't have minded a little "metra bump" when we sold that condo 4 years later, oh well. we still did alright on it).

I was on a SB brown line train this AM and witnessed chunks of concrete missing on the flyover exposing the rebar mesh. In maybe 8-10 areas. It didn’t look intentional because the 1 - 2 sqft areas were all organic in geometry. It was like a few inches of the outer layer was missing.