Laura Washington is a political commentator and longtime Chicago journalist. Her columns appear in the Tribune every other Wednesday. Write to her at LauraLauraWashington@gmail.com.
The future of Chicago resides in its neighborhoods. The lions who ferociously guard the Art Institute on Michigan Avenue also could be roaming the grassy fields of Garfield Park. A migration in investment is already underway. Explosive development around the United Center and Fulton Market is leading expansion and energy away from the Loop.
The new Chicago Fire soccer stadium will sit near the intersection of Chinatown, Bronzeville and Pilsen. It could trigger a surge of business and developer interest in the surrounding areas.
It should.
All of my life, Chicago has been a deeply divided city — by race, class, income, mobility, education achievement, even life expectancy. The haves and have-nots. I lived it as a native of Chicago’s South Side. Too many empty lots, boarded-up stores and homes of my childhood are still there.
I have reported it as a longtime journalist dedicated to racial equity. Lay out a map of anything of value in Chicago, such as health outcomes, mortality, crime, education achievement and housing access. The city’s neediest neighborhoods always end up on the downside. The wealth and resources reside downtown and on the North Side. The lows languish in the Black and Latino communities on the South, West and Northwest sides.
For most of Chicago’s 189-year lifetime, the city powers have focused on the central city as the driver of prosperity and growth. In this complex 21st century, the city will never prosper if it leaves its neighborhoods behind.
“Horizon Lines: Visions for Chicago 2050,” a World Business Chicago initiative, is looking for “bold” new ideas that will transform the city.
It’s time to get radical. Time to boldly flip the script. Bring the glittering downtown institutions and their resources to the communities that need them most.
It is about thinking differently about how we plan for the city.
Decentralized growth is better than centralized growth. When everything is focused on the Loop, the way the city has always been, the neighborhoods are starved. North Michigan Avenue, the Gold Coast and Millennium Park can take care of themselves.
Here are a few radical ideas.
Move the Art Institute of Chicago to the ‘hood. Well, at least part of it.
The proud bronze lions outside the Art Institute are getting very annoyed and starting to grumble. They are asking: “Is the museum really going to put up another enormous building? It will make our kingdom ungovernable.” They would love to extend their kingdom, they tell me, to cavort in an iconic Chicago neighborhood.
The Art Institute has plenty of space. Nearly 1 million square feet that support a permanent, 300,000-item collection of artworks. There is a lot to choose from.
In September 2024, the museum announced it had received a $75 million donation for a new building that would house its modern art collection from the 19th and 20th centuries. The donation, from longtime art collectors Aaron I. Fleischman and Lin Lougheed, is the largest naming gift the museum has ever received. At the time, the museum said a new space would be constructed on its existing downtown campus.
The gift “will allow the museum to realize building plans to expand access to the museum’s singular collection, maximize the Art Institute’s iconic location, and deliver a world-class experience to Chicagoans and visitors from around the world,” according to the announcement. Few details have been announced since.
Why build another monument in the city’s crowded downtown? Bring part of that magnificent collection of art to the community. Build a branch of the Art Institute in the middle of Garfield Park on the city’s West Side. It could be a companion to the heralded Garfield Park Conservatory, a gorgeous botanical garden.
While we are at it, let’s reclaim pivotal history. Bring back “The Stroll.” In the 1920s and 1930s, it was a stretch in Bronzeville along South State Street from 26th to 39th streets. Packed with nightclubs, bars, restaurants, movie theatres and an array of other thriving businesses, The Stroll was a Black creative and cultural hub that became known as the jazz capital of the world.
The Savoy Ballroom, Club DeLisa, the Sunset Café and The Plantation Café were all part of the Black entertainment ecosystem, the scene for the see-and-be-seen. “The Stroll was where the action was. This section of State Street was jammed with black humanity night and day,” according to the Encyclopedia of Chicago.
Chicago’s Black entertainment district not only drew all classes of African Americans, but also was a showcase to the outside world.
Witness the pure joy and exuberance of that time in the painting “Nightlife,” by the exceptional Chicago artist Archibald Motley, who chronicled Black life in the Jazz Age and later.
Bring in the people of color as investors who can re-create a 21st century district that would become a safe and rich haven for entertainment and commerce.
Convince the city’s powers to consult with advisers and decision-makers with deep roots in the neighborhoods — community leaders, organizers, educators and art-makers. Power must be relinquished. That will not happen unless the vision is intentionally diverse and participatory.
Prioritize the populations that have been left out of the conversation. Engage in real, ongoing collaborations — not phony one-offs. The people doing the planning must be front and center, not secondary players waiting for handouts.
Those voices will tell you where to go. Daniel Burnham, the great Chicago architect and urban planner, famously said: “Make no little plans. They have no magic to stir men’s blood and probably will not themselves be realized.”
Make big plans for the men and women of the neighborhoods.
Laura Washington is a political commentator and longtime Chicago journalist. Her columns appear in the Tribune every other Wednesday. Write to her at LauraLauraWashington@gmail.com.