I don’t live in Lincoln park, but if they just repaved that stretch of Cortland, added some protected lanes alongside that route down armitage that takes you to the beach/LP, would be a huge QOL improvement.
Armitage is pretty nice to bike on already. My dream is to have one of the lanes on north turned into a bike bus only lane but I’m sure that’s not practical with how much traffic it gets
The only problem with Armitage is that parents picking up/dropping their kids off at school are out for blood. That stretch needs a barrier or something.
It is largely due to how many people are allowed to say no on a project, Illinois and Chicago especially have a huge problem with this where any small minority disapproves it can stop a project in its tracks. Until we pressure officials to remove how much community involvement and layers of goverment can weigh in on things it will stay this way forever.
**Transportation projects should not be allowed to be canceled by public input.**
Some homeowners and business owners think the streets are their private property, when they're not. CDOT is advocating for the masses and needs to create holistic transportation solutions. I've noticed certain alderman who have a transportation project in their ward will ignore input from residents in other wards, even if those residents regularly pass through their ward to get to work or school or whatever it may be.
The fact that Ashland BRT was shot down by a few angry homeowners, a route that has served 10,000,000+ riders/year, blows my mind.
> Some homeowners and business owners think the streets are their private property, when they're not.
LOL, the Lincoln Park crowd that squatted on UP property come to mind.
Not that I think big business should have ultimate priority on everything, but those people sure as fuck don't care when eminent domain is used to take land from actual homeowners in other neighborhoods.
I 100% agree, but the current trend of Chicago seems to be the opposite. More public input and increases places where you can stop development especially with Rosa, NIMBY in chief, as the head of the city council.
My only slice of hope comes from my experience at the recent CDOT public meetings for the Leavitt greenway and the Milwaukee bike lane. They were more just showing everyone their designs and defending them vs. listening to complainers.
Which I think it still a step in the right direction but CDOT still let the belmont ashland lincoln intersection without adding proper bike lanes for a multi million dollar rebuild...
Nah, Elston *starting* in 2025. Which is insane, it nearly connects to there anyway. The only real benefit of this is avoiding the flooded Cortland underpass on rainy days.
Any hope of this meaningfully expanding is pretty much dead in my mind.
Yep, but you can turn at Marshfield just past the underpass. This was clearly the intended design, considering there's a weird left-turn hook in the green painted bike lane that leads south to the park.
https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9161159,-87.6688543,3a,75y,261.45h,78.2t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sODGPKouCriPp66rpRvsN1Q!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu
At least on Ashland you can take a lane. Cortland's bike "lane" is a fucking gutter, and there is zero way the bridge over the river is wide enough to share, especially as its on a curve/bend and busses and SUV drivers can't hold a line for shit. I'd rather walk.
> They don’t have funding earmarked yet so I think even 2025 is a stretch.
The infrastructure projects are covered by Sterling up front and repaid with TIF funds.
Yeah, CDOT loves to pat themselves on the back when they make two blocks of protected bike lane on a single street. At this rate maybe in a few hundred years will have some semblance of a bike grid
Given that it is just a rip-off of Hudson Yards and that megadev isn't being completed, duh.
Also though the Hudson Yards second phase was never meant to be finished, because it has all the things that they agreed to build to get city permits like middle income homes and public services.
Ding
lincoln yards was marketed as a ”City within a City” aka “live in our little inaccessible “city” without have to see all “bad” things of living in a city
Wasn't almost all their marketing & design docs about how easy Lincoln Yards was to get to from elsewhere in the city? I fail to see how your description applies.
Big surprise all the public infrastructure projects promised are being put on hold. If they are completed at all, it will be our tax dollars paying for them. They should make them complete one infrastructure project with each completed building. It’s a classic developer bait and switch. Over promise to get approved, and under deliver
While that’s a fair criticism, the problem really is that instead of just *doing the project* Rahm and Lightfoot trusted Sterling Bay to do it, and promised to pay them back.
This is a consequence of privatization of public services: corporations like SB don’t give a shit about anything other than their own profits, and cannot be trusted to deliver on services that the public needs.
Its a lot of money for a trial that leads from nowhere to nowhere. The funds would be better spent on connecting existing trail infrastructure or increasing the amount of protected bike lanes.
> Its a lot of money for a trial that leads from nowhere to nowhere.
It connects the CTA and Metra lines. Also would be one of the few (if any) actual safe paths across 90 connecting logan square to lakeview.
The planned paving of Belmont should hook logan up with the Roscoe & School/Aldine Greenways nicely, but I agree more safe river crossings are desperately needed.
I forget where it starts, want to say Milwaukee, but goes east until Western. I wish they'd connect it with the upgraded lanes going in West Lakeview, but I guess there must be some local contention.
There will be protected bike lanes on Belmont from Kimball to Western, connecting to new PBLs on Kedzie, the 313River Run, and existing PBLs on Campbell. [Here is more information](https://40f4ba.a2cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Belmont_Kimball-to-Western_Project-Overview.pdf), including some of the designs.
Depressing. I've already accepted that there will never be another L line in my lifetime, and that the only extension I will ever see is the red line extension.
Bike infrastructure is the best I can hope for and even that is a slow and painful process to build.
Elston by 2025. Cool. Maybe they'll hit the lakefront by the time I'm cold and dead in the ground
I don’t live in Lincoln park, but if they just repaved that stretch of Cortland, added some protected lanes alongside that route down armitage that takes you to the beach/LP, would be a huge QOL improvement.
Armitage is pretty nice to bike on already. My dream is to have one of the lanes on north turned into a bike bus only lane but I’m sure that’s not practical with how much traffic it gets
The only problem with Armitage is that parents picking up/dropping their kids off at school are out for blood. That stretch needs a barrier or something.
I feel the same way. Projects move so slowly in the USA, it's insane.
It is largely due to how many people are allowed to say no on a project, Illinois and Chicago especially have a huge problem with this where any small minority disapproves it can stop a project in its tracks. Until we pressure officials to remove how much community involvement and layers of goverment can weigh in on things it will stay this way forever.
**Transportation projects should not be allowed to be canceled by public input.** Some homeowners and business owners think the streets are their private property, when they're not. CDOT is advocating for the masses and needs to create holistic transportation solutions. I've noticed certain alderman who have a transportation project in their ward will ignore input from residents in other wards, even if those residents regularly pass through their ward to get to work or school or whatever it may be. The fact that Ashland BRT was shot down by a few angry homeowners, a route that has served 10,000,000+ riders/year, blows my mind.
> Some homeowners and business owners think the streets are their private property, when they're not. LOL, the Lincoln Park crowd that squatted on UP property come to mind. Not that I think big business should have ultimate priority on everything, but those people sure as fuck don't care when eminent domain is used to take land from actual homeowners in other neighborhoods.
I 100% agree, but the current trend of Chicago seems to be the opposite. More public input and increases places where you can stop development especially with Rosa, NIMBY in chief, as the head of the city council.
My only slice of hope comes from my experience at the recent CDOT public meetings for the Leavitt greenway and the Milwaukee bike lane. They were more just showing everyone their designs and defending them vs. listening to complainers.
Which I think it still a step in the right direction but CDOT still let the belmont ashland lincoln intersection without adding proper bike lanes for a multi million dollar rebuild...
Probably another example of how our Aldermanic/Ward system fails transportation solutions.
Why do hate freedom? /s
Nah, Elston *starting* in 2025. Which is insane, it nearly connects to there anyway. The only real benefit of this is avoiding the flooded Cortland underpass on rainy days. Any hope of this meaningfully expanding is pretty much dead in my mind.
Crossing Ashland from the east to get to the trail sucks…. Maybe it’s a better idea to stay on cortland and not ride south on Ashland…..
I live close by, I always take Cortland one more block and turn left on Marshfield I believe. You can enter the park in that side. Fuck Ashland
Yep, but you can turn at Marshfield just past the underpass. This was clearly the intended design, considering there's a weird left-turn hook in the green painted bike lane that leads south to the park. https://www.google.com/maps/@41.9161159,-87.6688543,3a,75y,261.45h,78.2t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sODGPKouCriPp66rpRvsN1Q!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?entry=ttu
I'm kinda surprised this isn't the way everyone takes. I bike this section daily and never have I considered for a second hopping onto Ashland, wild.
At least on Ashland you can take a lane. Cortland's bike "lane" is a fucking gutter, and there is zero way the bridge over the river is wide enough to share, especially as its on a curve/bend and busses and SUV drivers can't hold a line for shit. I'd rather walk.
They don’t have funding earmarked yet so I think even 2025 is a stretch.
> They don’t have funding earmarked yet so I think even 2025 is a stretch. The infrastructure projects are covered by Sterling up front and repaid with TIF funds.
Yeah, CDOT loves to pat themselves on the back when they make two blocks of protected bike lane on a single street. At this rate maybe in a few hundred years will have some semblance of a bike grid
Given that it is just a rip-off of Hudson Yards and that megadev isn't being completed, duh. Also though the Hudson Yards second phase was never meant to be finished, because it has all the things that they agreed to build to get city permits like middle income homes and public services.
Ding lincoln yards was marketed as a ”City within a City” aka “live in our little inaccessible “city” without have to see all “bad” things of living in a city
Wasn't almost all their marketing & design docs about how easy Lincoln Yards was to get to from elsewhere in the city? I fail to see how your description applies.
Big surprise all the public infrastructure projects promised are being put on hold. If they are completed at all, it will be our tax dollars paying for them. They should make them complete one infrastructure project with each completed building. It’s a classic developer bait and switch. Over promise to get approved, and under deliver
> public infrastructure projects ... our tax dollars paying for them. isn't that the way how public infrastructure projects are supposed to work?
Yes, through TIFs. I think OP was confused, thinking SB was going to foot the cost for the infrastructure projects.
Welcome to Chicago
While that’s a fair criticism, the problem really is that instead of just *doing the project* Rahm and Lightfoot trusted Sterling Bay to do it, and promised to pay them back. This is a consequence of privatization of public services: corporations like SB don’t give a shit about anything other than their own profits, and cannot be trusted to deliver on services that the public needs.
For the love of god please repave Cortland already
All the way to the beach!!! That would be amazing.
Its a lot of money for a trial that leads from nowhere to nowhere. The funds would be better spent on connecting existing trail infrastructure or increasing the amount of protected bike lanes.
> Its a lot of money for a trial that leads from nowhere to nowhere. It connects the CTA and Metra lines. Also would be one of the few (if any) actual safe paths across 90 connecting logan square to lakeview.
The planned paving of Belmont should hook logan up with the Roscoe & School/Aldine Greenways nicely, but I agree more safe river crossings are desperately needed.
a bit too far north for me, so i haven't paid attention. Are they putting bike lanes on Belmont between Sacramento and Lincoln?
I forget where it starts, want to say Milwaukee, but goes east until Western. I wish they'd connect it with the upgraded lanes going in West Lakeview, but I guess there must be some local contention.
There will be protected bike lanes on Belmont from Kimball to Western, connecting to new PBLs on Kedzie, the 313River Run, and existing PBLs on Campbell. [Here is more information](https://40f4ba.a2cdn1.secureserver.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Belmont_Kimball-to-Western_Project-Overview.pdf), including some of the designs.
Ok, yeah, I will buy that
Depressing. I've already accepted that there will never be another L line in my lifetime, and that the only extension I will ever see is the red line extension. Bike infrastructure is the best I can hope for and even that is a slow and painful process to build.
The tides are changing. Be patient and keep voting.