Just drove up lakeshore drive from the south (Chicago, Hinsdale: purchase, living)

[reppin_the_847]

lol his post is sort of a buzzkill, but he does have a point actually.

Originally Posted by ERS-One

Christ almighty are you insufferable.

[Manigault]

Originally Posted by chet everett

Well I too think that the view is quite lovely, but having lived and worked on the southside I also know that that "wide open spaces" that make for good panoramic vistas mean that PEOPLE on the southside generally have awfully crummy access to the lakefront!

Well, you are going back quite a few years.

If you examine the LSD bridge over the river, you can see it is a two-level bridge. It was designed to have railroad tracks on the lower level for a commuter train to go along the north lake shore.

That bridge was christened by Roosevelt during the Depression. But shortly thereafter the north side folks in Edgewater and Rogers Park fought off attempts to put commuter rail tracks between them and the lake.

On the south side, it was different so the IC had those ugly electric lines between the residences and the lake. It is a situation which was about 80 years in the making.

Now, the question of how to repair the lake front shoreline on the south side and the construction debris means that there are those obscene piles and the fences on the south part of lake shore drive. Still, driving from 71st street all the way to Hollywood is still a stunning vista. The downtown skyline from south lake shore drive is quite beautiful.

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by reppin_the_847

lol his post is sort of a buzzkill, but he does have a point actually.

If folks would spend a little time on some of the surface streets on the south side they'd understand how / why it is so tough for some areas to capitalize on the lakefront.

Try this -- walk from DePaul to the Lake. You could take Fullerton or even better Belden. There are some small shops west of Halsted, and a bit of "national chain" grossness, but overwhelming there are inviting boutiques and locally owned resturants. You walk past increasingly expensive and plush homes, the park, the Nature Museum, the Zoo, the lagoon. No thoroughfare is more than a few lanes wide, which might frustrate motorists, but MAN it is excellent for moms/dads/nannies with strollers!

Now try the same thing from say IIT. It is very similar in linear distance. Unfortunately the walk is very much less pleasant. First you gotta stick to 31at, becuase some lunatic let every other apartment developed down there "break the grid" and end up in a cheesy parking lot with some desolate excuse for landscape ringing it. Instead of "parklike" it looks like something from "Brazilia" or just cover for folks to hide doing whatever they do in the underbrush. There is a scarcely any retail down there -- those parking lots are often just a holding pen for cars that must have their owners shopping pretty far away. State St is practically a highway with all the lanes it has,MLK with its massively over scale parkway is no better. Trees can't grow well on such a median and the city does not spend on plants they way it does downtown. There are a handful of stately looking homes scattered between churches and apartment buildings but looks more the remnants of a deserted "past world" from a sci-fi movie than the bustling yuppie-ville to the north. Where things in LP pick up with the tourist centric features east of Stockton down here Cottage Grove is a line of "no man's land" -- the former Micheal Reese ruins, the storage lots of McCormick Place littered with semi-trailers, those damned rail yards, the world's most land wasting set of on & off ramps to LSD and then FINALLY a wisp of beach that not surprisingly is often desolete. If you like "desert island" you can find it here, mere minutes south of the Loop...

I really was disappointed to see that NOTHING has happened down there since the failed Olympic bid. I will not be happy to see a casino bring its crappy Jersey City-esque style "urban renewal" to the south side , but I doubt anything better is in the works...

[sunnyandcloudydays]

Originally Posted by jman07

It was one of the most beautiful sites i've seen. I have lived in the city for a while and normally don't take lakeshore, but today was so beautiful with the sun setting. I saw festivals outside, everyone outside running and riding, people playing volleyball on the beach as far as you could see, people relaxing on oak st beach, the downtown skyline. Then on the rest of my drive there were people packed eating outside at restaurants/bars. Makes me realize how great Chicago is. I was so jealous and wanted to be out there. I actually wasn't in a hurry to get home anymore.

That is a scenic drive, I sometimes like it in the morning when the waves are pounding thea beach in late septemeber ,just awesome makes you appreciate the city even that much more with a sight like this.
lucky we all live in this area that is second to none, not in my eyes

[sunnyandcloudydays]

Originally Posted by Vlajos

ok

[sunnyandcloudydays]

Originally Posted by ERS-One

Christ almighty are you insufferable.

not that bad

[Irishtom29]

Too bad Chet wasn't around in the mid 1800s to give the Illinois Central proper advice on where to put their tracks.

[chet everett]

Originally Posted by Irishtom29

Too bad Chet wasn't around in the mid 1800s to give the Illinois Central proper advice on where to put their tracks.

Ritchie had some slick plan to "deck over" the tracks close to his pied-à-terre but after his little "airport renovation" experiment it never got much past the "pretty pictures for a pipe dream" stage...

It all comes down to dough-re-mi !!! If Chicago ever grows another real powerhouse dealmaker of a congress member like Rosty (who figured out how to build the whole damned parking garage for Museum of Science and then bury it all at taxpayer expense...) I am sure they could create the most impressive rail tunnel this side of the English Channel. It probably would do more good than Boston's Big Dig... (and if the pols line their pockets with postage stamps and give away custom embroidered office chairs well its only money...)

[Manigault]

I've often thought that the Metra trains coming into the downtown and particularly the IC, should be underground. Since it is electric, this would be particularly appropriate for that line. However, I think there is real junk under the tracks, along with a shallow water table, so I don't know how they could do it.

What many folks on the north side don't realize is that there is available, free parking on the lakeshore at 31st street and at 63rd street. As a result, beach goers in those areas are not necessarily local residents. The beach and marina from 63rd street to 67th street are particularly scenic.

[Irishtom29]

Originally Posted by Manigault

What many folks on the north side don't realize is that there is available, free parking on the lakeshore at 31st street and at 63rd street. As a result, beach goers in those areas are not necessarily local residents. The beach and marina from 63rd street to 67th street are particularly scenic.

The old parking lots at 31st are closed for the harbor expansion and the new lots have meters.