B12 Solipsism

In honesty, I don’t know much about Paul Vallas’ campaign for Mayor, but any idiot who spam texts me at 12:33 AM should not be allowed near public office. There is now zero chance I will vote for this jerk.

embiggen by clicking
https://flic.kr/p/2dCipCd

I took Paul Vallas Lost My Vote on December 20, 2018 at 11:50PM

and processed it in my digital darkroom on December 21, 2018 at 07:56AM

update: IFTTT posted this image 5 times, so far. Sigh.

I always thought that Sam Zell was the worst owner the Chicago Tribune ever had, but Michael Ferro seems much worse.

NPR reports:

Several months after taking control of the troubled Tribune Publishing Co. in 2016, Chicago investor Michael Ferro convened a session of corporate leaders from within his own news empire, including chief news executives from such storied papers as the Los Angeles Times, the Chicago Tribune and The Baltimore Sun.

The group of about 20 people trooped from Chicago’s iconic Tribune Tower on Michigan Avenue to an upscale restaurant nearby. In a private room, participants dined on seafood and steak while Ferro, then the company’s chairman, held forth on his plans.

His own net worth was newly in the nine figures. Associates and peers say Ferro held ambitions that were wide-ranging, even audacious, given the newspaper industry’s stiff headwinds.

At the dinner, as at other moments, Ferro railed against those who he felt were impeding him — including perceived rivals and competitors. Among them: the Southern California billionaire and civic leader Eli Broad, whom Ferro called part of a “Jewish cabal” that ran Los Angeles.

(click here to continue reading Tribune, Tronc And Beyond: A Slur, A Secret Payout, And A Looming Sale : NPR.)

Yeah, and this:

Early this year, however, Tribune Publishing made the first in a series of secret payments to total more than $2.5 million to avert a threatened lawsuit filed by a fired newspaper executive, according to three people with knowledge of the deal. That had the effect of keeping Ferro’s anti-Semitic slur out of the public spotlight.

…

The company agreed to secretly pay Maharaj more than $2.5 million, in installments, according to three people with knowledge of the pact. That financial obligation was not disclosed in corporate filings to shareholders and analysts. The payments started in the first quarter of this year, for which Tribune Publishing reported a net loss of $14.8 million. The loss was attributed to the company’s decision in December 2017 to pay Ferro $15 million in consulting fees even as he served as chairman and was the company’s controlling owner.

…

Even as the company cut back jobs in traditional newsrooms, Levinsohn and other executives acted to create a separate staff apart from the LA Times and its other newspaper properties. He planned to draw upon outside writers, some uncompensated or who would even pay for the privilege of being associated with the newspapers’ brands. Plans included a consolidated entertainment website called LA.com and the outsourcing of Washington coverage to the digital news service Axios. Neither of those initiatives came to fruition. (LA.com still says “coming soon.”) But the digital strategy, gravitas with scale, sparked distrust among journalists.

The kicker is Michael Ferro still owns 25% of the Tribune, or what’s left of it as Ferro’s hand picked lackies furiously fire writers and jack up executive compensation to pull whatever profits they can off while the Tribune still exists.

Chicago Tribune:

City nears takeover of North Side rail line, in move to create new public transit route.

Chicago is close to assuming control of abandoned railroad tracks that run through Goose Island, a key step toward creating a public transit route along the Chicago River on the city’s North Side.

On Wednesday, the City Council is expected to vote to take over rights to the Chicago Terminal Railroad line. The former freight train route could eventually become part of a transit way for buses or trains that the city wants to create from the edge of Lincoln Park and Bucktown to commuter trains at Ogilvie Transportation Center.

The route would boost public transportation options between downtown and an area of the North Side expected to see a dramatic influx of residents and office workers. The plan has the potential to reduce traffic and relieve crowding on the CTA’s Red, Blue and Brown Line trains.

A trip from Lincoln Yards — on land along the river between Webster and North avenues — to Ogilvie could take as little as 12 minutes under the preliminary plan, said Ald. Brian Hopkins, 2nd, whose ward includes much of the proposed transit route.

(click here to continue reading City nears takeover of North Side rail line, in move to create new public transit route – Chicago Tribune.)

Hmmm. More public transit options is more better, right? 

Cook County Record:

In the wake of a vote to approve a sale that would reportedly pave the way for the largest condos-to-apartments conversion in Chicago to date, a group of condominium owners in the River City complex have filed suit to block the more than $90 million sale, accusing the condo association board of working with the would-be buyers to essentially target and bribe certain unit owners to persuade them with secret “side deals” to vote to approve the sale.

The collection of condo owners, including owners on both sides of the vote to sell the South Loop condo complex to developer Marc Realty, filed their complaint in Cook County Circuit Court on Oct. 3 through attorneys with the firm of Chuhak & Tecson, of Chicago.…

According to the River City owners’ complaint, River City voters rejected two initial offers from Marc Realty for about $83.1 million and $92.2 million, respectively. In December 2017, unit owners appeared to approve a sale worth $100 million, with 79 percent of owners voting yes.

However, in May, Marc Realty terminated the sale, and then came back with an offer worth $90.5 million. About 77 percent of owners purportedly approved the sale at the lower purchase price in balloting that closed at the end of August.

However, opponents of the sale cried foul, and, according to the complaint, conducted an audit of the votes cast. They assert their audit indicates the purchase deal actually received only 72 percent of the vote.

Further, they alleged their information indicates the River City board worked with Marc Realty to hold the vote open, even though more than 90 percent of owners had voted, to allow the buyer to “bribe” as many as 35 owners with “additional consideration not set forth in the contract,” to change their votes from no to yes.

The complaint asserts this maneuver stands as a violation of the law, and should invalidate the vote, which they said “was the result of substantial misrepresentations .. to induce the owners to vote against their best interest.”

(click here to continue reading River City condo owners sue to block $90M sale to Marc Realty, say board conspired to ‘bribe’ holdouts, skew vote | Cook County Record.)

Wild. 

Unless this settles, I’d think this could drag out for years.

I wish I had time to listen to podcasts, this one sounds fascinating…

Chicago Tribune’s Steve Johnson:

“Anytime you see anybody drive over (to) a vacant lot in a limo, you know it’s no good.”

When you’re a reporter trying to bring a complicated story to life, quotes like that — wry, sharply worded, evocative of a much larger scenario — are pure gold.

And in the promising, new Chicago-focused podcast “The City,” chronicling the battle over vacant lots in North Lawndale that became illegal dumping sites in the 1990s, lead reporter and narrator Robin Amer recognizes that quote for the gem that it is.

It comes from Gladys Woodson, one of the residents who tried to fight the illegal dumps, a story that would lead to FBI surveillance, court cases and a picture window into city corruption during the early years of the reign of the second Mayor Daley, the podcast asserts.

The first episode of “The City” debuts Monday, under the auspices of USA Today and available there and on iTunes, Stitcher and the like. In it, the host promises the first season’s Chicago illegal dump story will be one of “corruption, apathy and greed,” a story dark enough to stun even hardened city dwellers.

(click here to continue reading Review: ‘The City’ podcast tells sordid tale of illegal dumping on Chicago’s West Side – Chicago Tribune.)

Politicians and other elite from the dinosaur era (i.e., pre-internet) escaped being judged for a lot of bad behavior. I can just imagine stories like this becoming viral in today’s hyper-focused era. 

Chicago Tribune:

Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s administration and a group of aldermen vigorously defended a clout-heavy scrap yard on Tuesday, brushing aside neighbors who shared stories about noxious pollution and loud noises from one of the last industrial operations in a fast-gentrifying corridor along the North Branch of the Chicago River.

One of the neighborhood’s elected representatives, Ald. Brian Hopkins, 2nd, introduced a measure months ago to revoke a special waiver that allows General Iron Industries to collect flattened cars, used appliances and other scrap metal around the clock and operate massive shredders from 5 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily.

City rules normally restrict scrap yards to operate from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m.

(click here to continue reading Emanuel, aldermen block attempt to cut hours of troubled North Side scrap shredder – Chicago Tribune.)

If I lived near here, I’d be really pissed too. 5 in the morning is way too early to be making such a racket. 

The place sounds like a menace anyway. 

After Hopkins forced colleagues to call his measure for a vote, Tuesday’s long-delayed hearing quickly devolved into heated personal attacks from a former federal prosecutor hired by the company’s owners, and repeated interruptions of neighborhood residents by Ald. George Cardenas, 12th, chairman of the city’s Health and Environmental Protection committee.

Hopkins, Ald, Michele Smith, 43rd, and community groups in Lincoln Park and Bucktown contend the scrap shredder is a menace to the public, citing clouds of metallic pollution that routinely waft into nearby residential areas and three crackdowns on General Iron by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the latest of which came in July.

…

Georgia Nicholson, who lives across the street from General Iron, says she hoses metallic particles off her patio several times every day. “I don’t know why the city doesn’t see these things,” she said.

…

“My job is to represent the people of my neighborhood who have been telling me since before I got elected about the explosions, about the noise, about the dust, about the oily film that they find on their cars, on their sidewalks, on their wading pools,” said Hopkins, who along with Smith and Ald. Scott Wauguespack, 32nd, is calling for the city to turn the site into a new park. “There is absolutely no question that General Iron is a nuisance and is a health hazard to the neighborhood.”

Clear Channel billboard at 600 W Randolph St

John O’Brien of Chicago real estate website, The Real Deal reported back in April:

AIC Hotel Group is suing MCZ Development, saying the developer didn’t disclose an air-rights deal for a billboard when the two made a Fulton Market land transaction.

The failure cost the chain an opportunity to build a hotel, according to the suit.

AIC in December bought a parking lot at 600 West Randolph Street from MCZ for $7 million, with plans to build a hotel on the land, the lawsuit contends. But after the deal closed, AIC learned that Clear Channel had an air rights deal that guaranteed a billboard on the building next door would not be obstructed, the suit said.

The billboard deal runs through 2042. The suit claims MCZ didn’t tell AIC about the billboard agreement before the Randolph Street land deal closed, nor was the air rights agreement ever recorded with Cook County.

(click here to continue reading AIC Hotel Group | Randolph Street Hotel | Lawsuit.)

wow. As an interested observer of this parking lot, I was curious as to why nothing had been built here in the hot Fulton Market area, year after year. Perhaps this is this reason? Presumedly, Clear Channel could sell the rights to AIC Hotel Group for some fee, but perhaps they want more than AIC Hotel Group is willing to spend. 24 years, 12 months a year, how much revenue could one billboard generate? If Clear Channel got $5,000 a month¹, that would be $1,440,000. If AIC offered Clear Channel $800,000 cash, would they accept it? I bet this is a solveable issue.

As a parenthetical thought, I miss the website, EveryBlock, as I would have heard of this story before today…

Footnotes:

1. a number I’m totally guessing at, btw [↩]

Block Club Chicago:

Could Chicago Become U.S. ‘Capital Of Street Art’?

After Embarrassing Mistakes, Plan To Save Murals Emerges

Streets and San crews blotted out work by famous artists across the city. Now, an alderman and a city agency are on a mission to celebrate — not erase — such work.

…

“Big companies can put ads all over the city and it’s hard to go about your everyday life without being bombarded with advertisements and messages from every angle,” [Max Temkin, co-creator of the popular Cards Against Humanity game] said. “To me, street art represents the other side of that, people claiming civic space for themselves, for the public good, to share something that’s really joyful and surprising and meaningful.”

(click here to continue reading Could Chicago Become U.S. ‘Capital Of Street Art’? After Embarrassing Mistakes, Plan To Save Murals Emerges – Block Club Chicago.)

Now that’s something to celebrate. I am obviously fond of “street art”, and would love to see more of it around the city, as long as it retains its subversive spirit. 

I like the sound of this…

“Not all murals are graffiti and not all graffiti is public art,” [city cultural official Mark Kelly], who was a longtime administrator at art-focused Columbia College Chicago, said. “Oftentimes, graffiti is a public nuisance and in those cases it should be removed.” 

Emphasizing that “public art should be respected and protected,” Kelly said that his agency, guided by the ordinance, will work with the Department of Streets and Sanitation to protect murals.

“This ordinance will mandate a more careful and coordinated process for identifying what is and what is not public art,” he said. “The process will encourage and protect murals and establish a process for treating damaged and endangered murals properly.”

Chicago Avenue Bridge For Sale

The funny thing is that this isn’t a joke! 

Loop North News reports:

 According to a public notice on the city’s website, the Chicago Avenue Bridge over the north branch of the Chicago River is available to anyone who will remove it at their expense, maintain it, and assume all financial responsibility.

 Otherwise, the bridge is expected to be demolished so that a non-movable concrete and steel bridge can be built.

The city is asking interested parties to send a letter by July 13 detailing means of funding, how the bridge will be moved, how quickly it will be moved, and where it will be moved to.

The current bridge at Chicago Avenue, a pony truss bascule bridge, opened to traffic in 1912, replacing a swing bridge that had been there since 1849. It was one of the first of the Chicago River bridges to have an operator house made of concrete and not wood. According to a 1911 report by Chicago Department of Public Works, the city intended to eventually build a subway under Chicago Avenue, and so the Chicago Avenue Bridge was specially designed to accommodate future construction of a double subway tunnel.

Today, with its rusted surfaces, broken lights, and loose wire, the bridge has suffered from lack of regular maintenance, according to Ward Miller, executive director of Preservation Chicago.

 

(click here to continue reading City offers Chicago Avenue Bridge free to good home – Loop North News.)

A shame that something engineered so well it lasted over 100 years is going to be discarded because the City has other priorities. 

Oxidized Infrastructure

Chicago Avenue Bridge

The Days Fell On Their Knees

Easier To Think

Carter H Harrison Mayor marker – Chicago Avenue Bridge (I think. Maybe Grand Ave?)

Aon building

The Chicago Tribune’s Blair Kamin reports:

Now Aon’s owner, the New York-based firm of 601W Cos., wants to take advantage of the neighborhood’s newfound popularity with a new observatory that would compete with existing ones at Willis Tower and 875 N. Michigan. But there’s no room inside Aon for an elevator leading to the aerie, so 601W charged Chicago architects Solomon Cordwell Buenz with putting one on the outside.

Crafted by principal Martin Wolf, SCB’s plan starts with a wedge-shaped, metal-and-glass entry pavilion that would rise on the southeast corner of Aon Center’s plaza — an appropriately simple form for this simple building. Descending on escalators to below-street passageways, visitors would wend their way to the elevator tower. City officials wisely insisted that the tower rise on the building’s northwest corner (and not on the southeast corner, as originally planned) so it would not disturb the clean lines of Aon’s park-facing side.

If you’re an acrophobe, the high-speed double-deck elevators that shoot up and down the tower won’t be for you. But for those who get a kick out of seeing a city from on high, the elevators could be the ultimate version of those glass-covered cabs that enlivened the hotels of the late Atlanta architect and developer John Portman. Portman’s genius was to make an elevator ride an event, not just a trip in a box.

…

While the elevator tower will be visible from Michigan Avenue, it promises to be a light and lacy presence rather than a mechanical eyesore. It might even be exciting at night as the cabs of its double-deck elevators create trails of light like comet tails, said Phil Hettema of Pasadena, Calif., the designer of the still-unnamed observatory and the spaces leading to it. The two-level observatory would occupy space above the building’s office floors that was originally devoted to cooling towers.

For those willing to pay more than the price of admission, an internal elevator would transport them from the observatory to the thrill ride, a mechanical-lift contraption called the Sky Summit. Its steel arms would lift a glass-sheathed cab with room for about 20 people nearly 30 feet above the roof, then lower the cab over Aon’s edge, holding it there for about 30 seconds as the floor changed from opaque to transparent to reveal views of Millennium Park far below. Next, the cab would bring everybody back to Aon’s rooftop, presumably glad to be alive. The engineers assure me it’s a tried-and-true system. (Pass the Valium.)

(click here to continue reading Aon Center makeover treats big banal skyscraper with respect. But about that thrill ride … – Chicago Tribune.)

I’m looking forward to riding this.

Aon Infrared

Culicchia & Co, West Loop

Anthony Todd reports:

As with many great things, Pizza City USA Tours were born out of a combination of love and frustration. “I was super annoyed reading yet another listicle online of the 7 hottest pizza places in Chicago,” explained founder (and Chicago food superstar) Steve Dolinsky. “And I had been to one of them that week and thought, this makes no sense.” Dolinsky, who you probably know as ABC7’s Hungry Hound, was startled to find that no one had done a really-for-real deep dive into Chicago pizza. So, he started eating.

185 pizza places (and some acid reflux and a lot of yoga) later, Dolinsky is, likely, the most comprehensive expert on Chicago pizza in the world. “In January and February of 17, I started on this major quest, doing 3 a day,” Dolinsky remembered.  “People talk about ‘3-a-days’ as if it were a workout, but mine were pizza!” The result: a new book coming in September called Pizza City USA: 101 Reasons Chicago is America’s Greatest Pizza Town. If you can’t wait that long (and want to eat pizza yourself), Dolinsky has also started his own tour company.

…

Be warned, though: this might not be what you think of as “Chicago Pizza.”

“Chicago is really a city of thin crust,” insisted Dolinsky. “My analogy: deep dish is to Chicago what Times Square is to New York.  It’s a thing for tourists, locals could really care less.” Most of the pizzas he’s covering in the book and on the tours are from a variety of non-deep dish styles, including tavern-style, Detroit-style, Neapolitan and Roman. A tour will visit places with different styles; for example, one of his bus tours will visit Labriola on Michigan Avenue for deep dish, Pizzeria Bebu for an artisan pie, Pat’s for a tavern-style pizza and Dante’s for a New York-style slice.

(click here to continue reading Steve Dolinsky Is Hosting Tours of Chicago’s Best Pizza | Chicago magazine | Dining & Drinking May 2018.)

I love this Steve Dolinsky quote.

I’ll dial his sentiment back a bit, I’ve eaten good deep dish pizzas over my lifetime. That said, the best pizza I’ve had in Chicago is always thin crust.

YRMV.

Slated for Destruction

Curbed Chicago reports:

As presented, the 680-foot skyscraper would deliver 370 rental apartments, a 165-room hotel, and an Equinox fitness club. Related Midwest’s owner Related Cos. acquired the Equinox brand in 2006 and plans to build as many as 75 fitness-oriented hotel projects.

…

Concealed on-site parking for 150 vehicles comes via an interior motorcourt accessible from the Randolph frontage road and the existing Court Place curb cut on Halsted. The development can provide additional vehicular capacity with a valet service. All commercial loading will take place off the street and within the envelope of the new building.

The project is seeking a zoning change in the form of amending an existing Residential-Business Planned Development at the site. It takes over an older, unbuilt plan from a different developer that had called for a 370-foot tower with 220 residential units atop a prominent 260-space parking garage.

Related acquired the stalled development site in 2016 and demolished the existing dilapidated buildings that fall. The current proposal grew its L-shaped footprint through the addition of an adjacent parcel and achieved greater density with a 2017 transfer of air rights from the neighboring Haymarket Brewery.

(click here to continue reading Chicago’s Equinox hotel tower proposed as West Loop ‘gateway’ – Curbed Chicago.)

Oh boy, more traffic in an area that can’t handle the traffic it has already, and that’s before all these new constructions finish…

58 story hotel and residential

Little Boxes

Lawmakers who wrote this bill must all live in houses and townhomes: not in condo buildings. Every building has some percentage of malcontents, and who wants to be deluged with complaints from those who never offer solutions, only problems? Especially in condominiums where the Board is an unpaid, volunteer position.

It’s the part about “telephone numbers and email addresses” that is causing a ruckus, and the ruckus has taken lawmakers by surprise.

Gene Fisher is the executive director of the Diversey Harbor Lakeview Association, a coalition of elected leaders from north lakefront condominium associations. Board members are concerned that publication of their personal contact information will exacerbate harassment from dissatisfied owners, he said.

“As one of our members put it, ‘Every building has some hostile occupants. What board member wants to get repetitive crank calls from owners who do nothing but complain, or have their email filled with crank messages?’” he said.

Such egregious behaviors could discourage qualified and responsible owners from serving on their association boards, he added.

“Many owners are very protective of their personal information,” said Derek Wilkinson, vice president at Associa Chicagoland, a management company. “They do not want every person in their association to have easy access to their personal contact information. There is no ability to opt out of this information sharing, so many owners and board members are feeling powerless.”

Some owners have said they will delete their email accounts, said Timothy Patricio, property manager at Park Tower Condominium Association in Chicago.

(click here to continue reading Amendment to Illinois condo law sparks outcry, leaves owners and board members ‘feeling powerless’ – Chicago Tribune.)

In Chicago at least, there has been serious talk of an ordinance that will supersede this law. Alderman Brendan Reilly of the 42nd Ward¹ and his colleague Brian Hopkins of the 2nd Ward introduced Amendment of Municipal Code Section 13-72-080 concerning requirements for examination of condominium association records by unit owners (PDF)

Can’t Get Out of Here

Howard Dakoff recently wrote:

 

On Jan. 17, 2018, Hopkins and Reilly did introduce a Chicago ordinance that would prohibit Chicago unit owners (other than board members) from obtaining a list of unit owners’ email addresses and phone numbers among other personal information. The ordinance goes even further and allows a condominium association to opt out of other mandated Section 19 disclosure requirements with a two-thirds vote of the unit owners.

 

The ordinance is in direct contradiction to the provisions of Section 19, and while the aldermen believe the city of Chicago possesses the authority to do so under a legal doctrine called “home rule” (where a municipality has the authority to adopt its own legislation that might even be contrary to other applicable statutes), the proposed ordinance is quite aggressive in its breadth. There is disagreement among attorneys as to whether the ordinance can outright nullify mandated provisions of Section 19.

 

If the ordinance is adopted, it is likely there will be litigation to follow for a judicial determination regarding whether the ordinance can accomplish its objectives.

 

(click here to continue reading Aldermen introduce ordinance to strike down controversial part of Illinois condo law – Chicago Tribune.)

I guess if I had to provide email/phone, I could use a Google Voice account, and create a “burner” email, but the process seems ridiculous. I hope either the Chicago ordinance is passed soon, or the IL legislature revises the underlying law. Or both could happen: Chicago passes the Reilly/Hopkins ordinance, and then eventually the entire state follows suit at some later time.

Footnotes:

1. the best Ward!! [↩]

Central Furniture Mart in better times

Alisa Hauser reports:

WICKER PARK — The neon Central Furniture Mart hung dangerously low to the sidewalk late Tuesday afternoon. No one was injured and the street surrounding the sign was closed to pedestrians and car traffic as contractors eventually hauled the sign away. Larry Merritt, a Chicago Fire Department spokesman, said that fire workers responded to a call of a “dangerous sign” at 11:52 a.m. Tuesday. There were no injuries, Merritt said.

…

Candise Cho, owner of neighboring Mildblend Supply Co., said that she has “always been concerned about the safety of pedestrians.”

“I know I find myself taking a deep breath each time I walk under it. I had hoped with new owners, it would have been taken down or better secured,” Cho said.

Cho said she did not call 911, but when she looked outside her store shortly before 12 p.m. when officials were on the scene, the sign was “much lower” than it had been in the past.

“It was very low. It had dropped,” Cho said.

(click here to continue reading Massive Central Furniture Mart Sign Hung Dangerously Low, Witnesses Say.)