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The Hot Topics
and Community Issues sections: Accessibility.
Affordability. Development.
Quality. Schools.
University of Chicago (some topics
in each: see after intro here)
Vermillion
selected to develop Harper
Ct.-53rd Lake Park.
CTA fare cuts Feb. 7: Alert
(in pdf.) Link
to CTA info. Metra fares go up
Help for Haiti information, events are in the Good
Neighbor/Volunteering page.
4th Ward Ald. Toni Preckwinkle wins big for County Board Pres.; who will her
replacement be as alderman?
The
hot topic groupings follows
A brief intro
The
sustainability of communities is largely determined by how well communities
keep people coming, connecting, and staying in places that give a sense of character,
quality of life, ability to work and thrive, with enough amenities, a sense
of good schools and public safety. It also depends on how well the people work
together to manage challenges and opportunities. One of the strongest measures
of such a community is its diversity-- and that has long been a hallmark and
pride of Hyde Park and Kenwood, buts some fear it is eroding. It should not
be surprising that the majority of the hot topics are related to guarding or
enhancing the qualities enumerated above.
Hyde Park has
had several defining moments, is this another?: Lakeshore suburban resort after
Paul Cornell won one of the first commuter stops in the country.
Growth after the Chicago Fire to become a larger resort with
mansions and hotels. Annexation to Chicago, then World's Columbian Exposition
and founding of the 2nd University of Chicago and huge parks fill in
an upper middle and upper class solid neighborhood while growing its cottage
homes, commercial districts to serve much of the South Side and keeping the
resort aspect too. In the 1920s the Illinois Central is electrified
leading to a dense belt in the east and three-flat infill west. Decline of housing
and commercial and changing demographics lead to a crisis in which the University,
neighbors and city undertake massive urban renewal while keeping
a varied historic housing stock. A
sense of unease by some that the neighborhood is being left behind
while the rest of the South Side starts to revive, infill and become a new Mid
South, University growth and desire that the neighborhoods around it match its
ambitions, and unease by others at prospects of change and especially threat
to affordability for present residents, all put Hyde Park at a crossroads
in the new millennium--destination community or not?
-- and at that moment comes prospects of Olympics-
NOT, Antheus Capital as a dynamic new player, possible Obama Effect, and the
backlash side of a bubble.
Topic
Sections (groupings): There find brief introductions and links
to specific topic hub homepages.
Red Hot Right Now
(for now visit the Development grouping (Harper dev. selected) and News
and Noted which has bits and a topics-with-news navigator)
Development (incl. Harper
Court, other projects and short general assessment)
Quality of community
Affordability/Ability to keep
and welcome people of diverse income levels
Getting Around including accessibility,
walk- and ride-ability, transit, parking
Schools and Youth
University of Chicago
Some specific
Key Hot Topics and Subjects found in those groupings
53rd Street
& Lake Park Business and TIF District (Development, University)
61st Street Garden (Development, University, Quality)
Accessibility and Complete Streets walkable in all seasons (Getting Around)
Affordability, ability to stay (Affordability)
Development, Community Planning, Managing Growth, and Preservation
Doctors Hospital Site (Development)
Harper Court (Development, also University)
Harper Theater (Development, also University)
Health Care changes, diminishment (Quality, University)
MAC Properties/Antheus Capital (Affordability, Development)
Nonprofit and Service Sectors healthy, working together (Quality)
Parking meter conversion and rising costs, parking on the lakefront (Getting
Around)
Parks, Lakefront and Green and Open Space (Quality)
Preservation and restoration (Development)
Public Safety (Quality)
Schools and Kids, Youth Programs and Opportunities, schools on probation
Shoreland Redevelopment (Development)
Sustainability (Quality)
Transit and Parking (Getting Around))
University of Chicago- role, community programs and engagement, growth, properties,
policies, Town-Gown relations
Unresponsive officials...
"Top
remaining" list at the end of 2009:
Harper
Court and Theater,
61st Garden,
University of Chicago civic engagement,
Health
Care Services/Policies,
Crimes (seriousness and vulnerability despite overall decline),
Schools on probation/CPS policies (but good things happening also),
Shoreland,
Nonprofits,
businesses, residents, public services and places suffering from the recession,
Recessionary threat to city services,
Worry about effects of city, state corruption and limited ethics reform,
Continuing wars and events at home and abroad
Went away by
later in 2009:
Olympic
impact, apparently any Obama Effect, Hopes for keeping the 61st Garden and
for a non-UC facility redevelopment of Doctors Hospital, Blue Gargoyle Service
Center (could not be saved); Short term starts on virtually any development
projects (although MAC remodeling's continue)
Emerging or
May Come Back- Watch for these:
Likely announcement
of a pre and primary U of C Lab School facility at Doctors Hospital site
Future of Meadville School and what happens if they and or McCormick Seminary
sell their buildings
A slump in city services?
Promontory Point shoreline reconstruction- Promontory
Point home and Promontory
Point Latest and as linked from these
Newly present or to be grateful
for:
Campus
projects including Logan Center for Arts; Hyde
Park Alliance for Arts and Culture and a generally positive year for arts
venues and organizations; growing jazz festival and many other festivals/fairs/community
events; the Op Shop; better health of the Neighborhood Club; many new businesses
opening - exceeding closures - including new grocers coming to the shuttered
47th Co-op space and 57th St, majority of businesses displaced from Harper
Theater and Harper Court found new spaces locally.
