Lollapalooza A Week Away

T-minus 7 days and counting until music fans invade Grant Park for a three day binge of music. Today, Greg Hinz from the Turn it Up blog, has a good read about the festival and how it's searching for it's identity within the city:

But questions remain about how fully Lollapalooza has embraced and been embraced by Chicago beyond the considerable revenue it brings to the local economy. In staging the biggest annual rock festival in the city’s history on Chicago’s showcase property, C3 is held to a particularly high standard. So far it has executed a hugely successful festival with few hitches. But the organization remains at arm’s length from the city’s music community – more of a formidable interloper than a trusted accomplice.

It's an interesting notion and probably true, but in our opinion that doesn't take away from the festival. We don't care who organizes it as long as we can enjoy a ton of world class music in the beauty of Grant Park.

Speaking of which, we've recently heard some good things from some co-workers about Airborne Toxic Event:

They plan on Sunday (8/9) at 2:30, should be solid.

More News About the Ickes Homes

Earlier in the week we read about the Ickes Homes and today the Skyline blog on Chicagotribune.com had a piece about the demolition that begins on Monday. The tone of the story is similar as it talks about the 'glory' days at the buildings and talks about how things have changed.

Also of interest and given that there was a lot of discussion on Sloopin about whether or not gentrification happened in the neighborhood we thought people would be interested in this excerpt:

Ickes is near downtown, close to the lake and blocks away from McCormick Place and U.S. Cellular Field. The housing development also is accessible to public transportation and the Kennedy and Ryan Expressways -- all of which make it fertile ground for redevelopment. The signs of gentrification are obvious.

The Opera Lofts, just behind Ickes on South Dearborn Street, advertise the area as "on the southern edge of the South Loop at the gateway to historic Bronzeville." Developers of the lofts, which feature large balconies and Egyptian marble countertops, also note the proximity to the proposed multibillion-dollar 2016 Olympic Village that would serve as a permanent 37-acre residential community after the games, if Chicago is awarded the bid Oct. 2.

Entourage Coming to 1355 S. Michigan

What is Entourage, we don't know...but thanks to an anonymous reader they pointed us to Everyblock and this general limited business license for a business called Entourage.

What is Entourage? At this point we don't know so if you do please tell us.

Ideally Jeremy Piven would be opening up a comedy club and use the name of his hit show Entourage as the namesake, but that's probably not the case. Our guess is that it's a Hair Salon...or maybe it's a restaurant.

Chocolate Walking Tour Comes to the Sloop

If you're like us Chocolate anything tends to be a favorite and consistent food form that we consume. If you associate with this sentiment then you will love Chicago Chocolate Tours. It's a business that encourages you to:

Take a delightfully fun and informative guided walking and tasting tour of select chocolate shops. Savor the flavors and walk off the calories on the sweetest tour in town! Uplift through chocolate!

They have a variety of tours through the loop, gold coast and magnificent mile, but also have a new tour for the South Loop:

New ~ Wednesdays at 5:45 pm - Chocolate Shops of the South Loop: Canady le chocolatier, Panozzo's, Marble Slab Creamery, Little Branch Cafe, Three Peas Art Lounge, WineStyles (note: wine will be served at the final stop!). Meet outside of Canady le chocolatier, 824 S. Wabash Avenue. Walking level: Intermediate.

For more information check out their site.

6 Ickes' Buildings Begin Demolition Process this Month

The Chi-Town Daily News has a nice article about the history of the Harold Ickes' Homes. It also gets into the demolition:

This month, officials began preparations to tear down six of the original nine structures at the Ickes Homes, opened in the 1950s. They say the buildings are too old to save, and that the residents who stayed now occupy little more than a third of the two structures that will remain standing.

We drove by the Ickes' Homes today and the most Northern building (at the corner of State and Cermack) has already started the demolition process. It looks like the windows/boards on the top 3 or 4 floors have already been knocked out. We wonder what the city has planned for this space?

The article speculates about commercial property or even a venue for the 2016 Olympics:

In March, officials at the authority announced that they would demolish six of the Ickes buildings. The decision, backed by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, has sparked speculation about whether the city will use the soon-vacant land for commercial development or a potential Olympic venue should Chicago win the 2016 bid.

(Image from Chi-Town Daily News)

NY Times Reports on Chicago's Olympic Bid & the Recession

The New York Times weighs in on Chicago's 2016 Olympic Bid and the problems it's encountering due to the current recession. Solid reporting but not a ton of new information. If you're an Olympic junkie (like me)...enjoy!

High-Speed Trains in the News Again

In theory we love the idea of high-speed trains. They seem to be a future forward idea that would benefit the region immensely. Today, 8 states and the city of Chicago signed an agreement committing to this idea.

High-speed trains sound very enticing, but this article in the Trib thinks it would be better to spend these billions of dollars on local projects like CTA and Metra repairs. In a perfect world we agree and would love to have billions spent. However, politicians probably like the fact that they're potentially improving the lives of people in 8 state across the Midwest.

Greg Hinz Weighs in on Olympic Ward Meetings

Greg Hinz, at Chicago Business, is one of the more opinionated voices in the Chicago media and generally speaking we usually like his take on topics. He weighed in on the Olympics and recently provided some good perspective:

That said, Mr. Daley and his Olympics dream are about to enter a critical phase. The City Council is set to vote late next month on whether to authorize that total guarantee after receiving an outside financial review by a firm hired by the Civic Federation.

The key question isn't whether operations of the Olympics have any real chance of losing a ton. The answer is, no. The games will sell tickets and TV rights, someone will pay them, and the thing quite probably will come in somewhere near budget.

The real question is about risk in building the things needed for the games, in particular the $300-million stadium and $1-billion housing village that will go where the former Michael Reese Hospital now stands.

Mixed Feelings in Our Gentrfication Poll

Thanks to everyone who weighed in on this issue. For more discussion, check out the post we did a couple of weeks ago. There are some great, thoughtful comments...

Tribune Article on Congress Hotel Strike

Not much new information in the article, but it's more or less a good update on the strike at the Congress Hotel. If you're not familiar with the strike, it's been going on for over 6 years and doesn't look to be ending anytime soon.

One interesting thing in the article was that it gave a sense of the owner of the hotel, Shlomo Nahmias. According to the article:

Those who have met Shlomo -- as he insists on being called -- recall him as a teddy bear of a man, friendly and playful in a gruff sort of way. He greets even new acquaintances with a slapping handshake and a hug. When the strikers were his employees, he'd greet them with the likes of "honey" or "dearie."

He's still a presence in their lives. Along with his wife and their dog, Nahmias lives in the hotel and takes a daily stroll down Michigan Avenue. That gives the strikers a flesh-and-blood target for the dogged determination they perhaps wouldn't have if they were fighting an impersonal corporation, invisible to them.

If You Missed Venetian Night...

We missed it too, but saw some of the floats thanks to this video by ABC7. Looks like a good time and it sounds like the highlight was the Michael Jackson Thriller boat. The Chicago 2016 boat (above) was also pretty great.

Also, there seems to be some concert/festival at Soka Gakkai (1455 S. Wabash) starting today. We tried to find info about this, but didn't have much luck. Our guess is that it's a 'peace' concert which is something they've been doing for awhile.

(image from ABC 7 Chicago)

Chicago Criterium Comes to South Loop this Weekend

Last year we were walking around and out of no where bikes were buzzing by us down Michigan avenue. Since we weren't expecting it needless to say we were surprised! If this sounds interesting, this Sunday is your chance to catch a glimpse of high speed cycling in our neighborhood:

The Chicago Criterium series of races will captivate spectators with its fast paced straight-aways and tight 90-degree turns in the heart of Grant Park. A criterium or "crit" is a cycling race held in a closed circuit loop and is approximately 1.1 miles in length. The high speed left turn action begins on Columbus Drive heading north to East Jackson Boulevard, south on Michigan Avenue, east on Balbo Avenue, then back to Columbus Drive.

The races begin at 7am and continue throughout the day. There is no price for admission. If you could care less about this, this also serves as a warning if you're riding you car. Avoid the Grant Park streets!

More on 2nd Ward 2016 Olympic Meeting

Michan Maidenberg, from Chicago Journal, thankfully attended the 2nd ward 2016 Olympic meeting on Tuesday and from the sounds of it, the tone was mostly positive. Not surprisingly there were still skeptics. A good read if you're into the Olympics.

One quote that stood out to us and in our mind represents the overall excitement but also the nervousness about the Olympics was from Anita Weissman:

After the meeting, Anita Weissman, a Chicago 2016 volunteer and someone interested in working professionally on a 2016 Games here was of two minds on the Olympics.

A native of the city, she thinks Chicago’s ethnic diversity and history could make an Olympics here like no other. But she paused before giving her full-throated support to the project.

“I think it’s an incredible opportunity. I think if it’s well done it will catapult the city to the next level,” she said. “I have to guess if it’s done badly, it will saddle us with 30 years of bad debt.”

We agree...

Daley Sounds Off On Olympic Naysayers

So last night was the 2nd ward 2016 Olympic meeting and unfortunately we couldn't make it. Did anyone have a chance to go? If so, we would love to hear your thoughts. We will also keep our eyes posted for other coverage of the 2nd ward meeting.

Regardless, there have been a couple articles we've recently read specifically talking about other ward meetings. Here is a lengthy recap from the Chicago Examiner and here is another one from the Chicago Tribune about the Lakeview 'ward' meeting.

Finally, we read another story about Mayor Daley blasting some of the Olympic naysayers:

“You’re against it. You were against Millennium Park. You were against 911. You were against Soldiers Field. You were against Meigs Field. What else were you against? You’re against a lot. But, that’s freedom of speech,” Daley said.

“Some people don’t want this. … That’s part of American democracy. They can stand up and say anything they want. … But, in the next five years, six years, tell me one [other] thing that can bring jobs and economic opportunities and, besides that, guarantee an investment by the federal government [of] billions of dollars in infrastructure. If you have something better, I’d love to see it.”