Let’s clean up Wabash Avenue and get everything on the street in the right place, like improved pavement markings and traffic signs; improved landscape; fewer pigeons and rats; safer intersections and more places for people to sit and linger.
Comments
Absolutely! Wabash is dark and dirty, so let's clean it up and keep it polished like the rest of the city. Let's have smooth streets, clearly marked lanes, shrubs on the sidewalks, anything to beautify the street.
This idea for improving Wabash Ave. is the most practical first step. Coming up with a way to cut off the tracks/platform from the street/sidewalk below while including drainage and maintenance from the CTA tracks will go a long way for improvement of this corridor. Coordinating a positive feel on the street level can include better lighting along with finding better ways for the CTA tracks above and the street level to co-exist.
Wabash Ave. - traditionally known as Jeweler's Row - functionally can serve as a gateway into the Loop. The new look needs to take into account the existing and future uses of the Jeweler's Row corridor along with the office, commercial, institutional and residential uses that feed onto the streetscape. Stakeholders that have been attracted to the Chicago Loop are looking at this part of the Loop as a viable location. By using a 'Jazzy' concept, this can enhance the perspective to the users. Ornamental and landscaping elements can be integrated next into the urban design of the street-scape to 'spice-up' this entry into the Loop from the South.
Mature trees would be a decent/obvious first step: they'd both buffer the racket from the trains and mask the tracks' unsightliness. The raised planters are silly: they're mainly rat dens (as mentioned above), plus they inhibit pedestrian travel much more than a tree planted at grade would... But the city needs to stop dropping in the 2" caliper twigs they usually do and invest in trees that are halfway grown: makes all the difference in the world.
One of the Chicago's unique streets with great potential needs to keep taking steps forward. A variety of placemaking strategies can be used to enhance the environment for pedestrians and bicyclists that, in turn, improve conditions for Wabash businesses to succeed.
Show support
Add your name to a growing list of supporters that will show decision-makers that this campaign should become a reality.
Transforming Wabash
Improve the Streetscape
Description:
Let’s clean up Wabash Avenue and get everything on the street in the right place, like improved pavement markings and traffic signs; improved landscape; fewer pigeons and rats; safer intersections and more places for people to sit and linger.
Related topics:
We need a cohesive landscape and MAINTENANCE plan along this street. No one currently maintains the planters that are there. I hate seeing all the rat holes in the existing planters. Needs to be shade-loving plant materials.
Absolutely! Wabash is dark and dirty, so let's clean it up and keep it polished like the rest of the city. Let's have smooth streets, clearly marked lanes, shrubs on the sidewalks, anything to beautify the street.
This idea for improving Wabash Ave. is the most practical first step. Coming up with a way to cut off the tracks/platform from the street/sidewalk below while including drainage and maintenance from the CTA tracks will go a long way for improvement of this corridor. Coordinating a positive feel on the street level can include better lighting along with finding better ways for the CTA tracks above and the street level to co-exist.
Wabash Ave. - traditionally known as Jeweler's Row - functionally can serve as a gateway into the Loop. The new look needs to take into account the existing and future uses of the Jeweler's Row corridor along with the office, commercial, institutional and residential uses that feed onto the streetscape. Stakeholders that have been attracted to the Chicago Loop are looking at this part of the Loop as a viable location. By using a 'Jazzy' concept, this can enhance the perspective to the users. Ornamental and landscaping elements can be integrated next into the urban design of the street-scape to 'spice-up' this entry into the Loop from the South.
Mature trees would be a decent/obvious first step: they'd both buffer the racket from the trains and mask the tracks' unsightliness. The raised planters are silly: they're mainly rat dens (as mentioned above), plus they inhibit pedestrian travel much more than a tree planted at grade would... But the city needs to stop dropping in the 2" caliper twigs they usually do and invest in trees that are halfway grown: makes all the difference in the world.
One of the Chicago's unique streets with great potential needs to keep taking steps forward. A variety of placemaking strategies can be used to enhance the environment for pedestrians and bicyclists that, in turn, improve conditions for Wabash businesses to succeed.
We need a cohesive landscape and MAINTENANCE plan along this street. No one currently maintains the planters that are there. I hate seeing all the rat holes in the existing planters. Needs to be shade-loving plant materials.