Piloting his bicycle along pock-marked Garfield Boulevard, Gary Lark waved a hand at faint images of former grandeur beside hopeful signs of rebirth.
More Top Picks Best Rain Jackets For Men Under 100
“See, those are new windows,” Lark said of a building under refurbishment just after riding by the husk of a building whose historical glory had been consumed by a fire.
“You can see some trash here, but you can also see an attempt to keep it up,” Lark said of Chicago’s historic boulevard system.
He joined close to 6,000 bicyclists who saddled up Sunday morning for the seventh 7th annual Chicagoland Bicycle Federation’s Boulevard Lakefront Tour.
The bicycle ride progressed in fits and starts through city traffic as it stretched in a 35-mile lariat through a crazy quilt of Chicago neighborhoods, from the swank to the struggling.
Randy Neufeld, the director of the federation, said a bicycle was the perfect tool to explore Chicago history.
“The boulevard system was really meant to be enjoyed at this speed,” Neufeld said, wading through the gaggles of helmeted bikers who had massed on the Midway Plaisance at the University of Chicago for the tour’s start.
A fair share of the pedaling swarm were true-blue cyclists: tanned, toned and none too interested in a history lesson, their spandex shining and muscles bunching.
A greater part of the tour-takers, however, were recreational bicyclists out to view the city at about the same speed to which carriages were restricted in 1871 on the southern boulevards, about 8 m.p.h. For those riders, the only thing that bunched were their shorts.
While it has been said that Chicago’s expressways were intended to truncate the city’s neighborhoods-rich from poor, black from white-the boulevard system from the beginning was intended to unify the city’s neighborhoods.
First envisioned by city booster John S. Wright in 1849 and embellished by planner Daniel Burnham in 1909, the system was to serve as arteries, connecting the city’s parks and enriching developers who could build on adjacent land.
The bike loop begins around Oakwood Boulevard to the south, continues west along Garfield to Gage Park, and then zigzags through more than 20 West Side streets before arriving at Logan Boulevard where it intersects Diversey Parkway.
The main boulevard system is composed of 21 boulevard segments, six squares and seven connected inland parks.
It holds monuments and statues, fountains and trees.
Along the broad ways are houses and bungalows in a variety of architectural styles: Doric, Gothic and Prairie, among others.
In years past, this boulevard system was promoted as the “Emerald Necklace.”
Today, in several places, it could be better described as a noose.
Places such as Western Boulevard contain areas of rotten buildings that sit in fields of thigh-high weeds.
“The Emerald Necklace has faded, for the city and for the personal life there,” said Grant Peters of the Lakeview neighborhood as he waited in line to have the tires of his bicycle filled.
“By going through, we sort of demystify some of the popular misconceptions,” said Charles Kurre, a Chicagoland Bicycle Federation administrator.
“That’s not the only thing that goes on in here.”
Indeed, Chicago’s Planning and Transportation Departments have earmarked federal funds for boulevard refurbishment, bringing back signs of life to some of the impoverished areas viewed on Sunday’s tour.
“There are glimmers of that glory popping back through again,” said Peggy Lami, a volunteer historian from Glen Ellyn who helped research the tour route.
“I’ve seen some incredible renaissance neighborhoods.”
Said Patricia Jones: “It’s really getting better around here.”
More Top Picks Best High Impact Sports Bras For Large Busts
Jones stood with a friend atop her stoop on Western Boulevard and boomed enthusiastic greetings of “Good Morning!” to the unremitting stream of bicyclists who pedaled by.
In addition to attempting to coalesce the city’s neighborhoods, the bike tour also was supposed to bring attention of the need to make Chicago more bicycle-friendly, Kurre said.
Waiting to put air in her tires before the tour began, Julia Lee of Old Town said she knew firsthand how unfriendly the city is now for bikes.
“Last year, I hit a biker with my car. He was on the wrong side of the road,” Lee said. Afterward, she stopped biking for a time.
“It really threw me off course,” she said.
While those who looked Sunday got glimpses of Chicago’s grand past, those who didn’t still got a workout, negotiating streets missing large swaths of pavement.
Everyone, of course, got a tan, as a sun unimpeded by clouds combined with temperatures hovering around 90 degrees to make the bikers a sweaty bunch.
And despite the usual assortment of nicks, scratches and bruises, no major accidents were reported, Neufeld said, though one man was hospitalized after blacking out for unknown reasons.Tribune photos by Bill Hogan