Recent Streetsblog CHICAGO posts about Events

What Could Chicagoans Learn About Rail Transportation From a Trip to Japan?

By John Greenfield | Apr 26, 2016 | 3 Comments

The Midwest High Speed Rail Association is hosting a train-focused tour of Japan that should offer Chicago residents a fascinating window on what’s like to live with truly world-class transit and railroad service. The trip, which takes place between September 27 and October 9, is an opportunity to check out how fast, frequent, and dependable […]

City Begins Work on Next 50 Miles of Bikeways, Funds Bikes N’ Roses

By John Greenfield | Apr 11, 2016 | 17 Comments

Today at a ribbon cutting for curb-protected bike lanes on 31st Street by the Illinois Institute of Technology, Mayor Emanuel and transportation commissioner Rebekah Scheinfeld elaborated on the city’s previously announced plan to build 50 more miles of bikeways by 2019. This represents a slower pace of installation than the city’s previous achievement of installing […]

This Year’s 49th Ward PB Ballot Includes a Few Transit Projects

By John Greenfield | Apr 9, 2016 | 5 Comments

Each of Chicago’s 50 wards gets an annual $1.3 million in discretionary “menu” funding to spend on infrastructure projects each year. Usually the alderman decides how the money is spent and typically most of the money is used for traditional projects like street resurfacing, sidewalk repair, and streetlamp installation. However, the growing participatory budget movement, […]

Outgoing 606 Project Manager Discusses The Trail’s Impact on Neighborhoods

By John Greenfield | Apr 6, 2016 | No Comments

The Trust for Public Land’s Chicago director Beth White announced last week that she will be leaving Chicago to take a new job as president and CEO of the nonprofit Houston Parks Board, beginning in June. White is best known here as the woman who led the development of the $95 million, 2.7-mile Bloomingdale Trail […]

NYC’s Sadik-Khan Charted Path for Major Street Changes There, Nationwide

By Steven Vance | Apr 1, 2016 | 2 Comments

One of the country’s most successful city transportation commissioners spoke on Tuesday night at the Metropolitan Planning Council about her experience working in New York City for seven years. Janette Sadik-Khan was hired by former mayor Michael Bloomberg in 2007 to implement the radical – for NYC and for that time in the United States – […]

Actually, the Lincoln/Ashland/Belmont Remix Will Be a Major Improvement

By John Greenfield | Apr 1, 2016 | 17 Comments

Last week a ward staffer provided me with a preview of plans for the Lincoln/Ashland/Belmont reconstruction project. From what I gathered from that conversation, the Chicago Department of Transportation was planning a relatively conservative redesign of one of the North Side’s most dangerous intersections. But at a public meeting about the initiative last week, I […]

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