These have not been the best of years for Chicago — we’ve taken our blows. Post-pandemic life has still not returned to normal, especially downtown. Ours is not the vibrant and bustling Loop of yesterday. We’ve got work to do to restore the luster of our once-great metropolis.
So why, then, have the powers that be decided that now is a brilliant time to make it more difficult for people to get to and around the city? I’m speaking of course about the three-year Kennedy Expressway construction project that has snarled traffic to unbearable levels for so many of us.
What once was a 15-minute drive from my neighborhood of Logan Square to my downtown workplace is now regularly 45 minutes. Friends from Park Ridge to the Pilsen neighborhood are rethinking their city lives — heading downtown for a meal or a show is no longer appealing given the travel time required. Just as downtown companies are encouraging workers to return to the office, a trend the Loop desperately needs to see continue, the traffic situation is giving workers one more reason to resist.
Travelers arriving at O’Hare International Airport are now faced with what can be a two-hour crawl to their downtown hotels. As a 35-year North Side resident, I can truthfully say I have not, until now, once considered moving away from the city. It’s that bad.
And one must ask, beyond “why now,” why at all? Bridge repairs, light changes, patching — isn’t this work that can be done in phases? Or without shutting half the workable lanes on a major thoroughfare? Where was the planning? Where is the creativity? Where is the urgency to bring quality of life back to Chicago so that we can reverse the population decline of our once-great city?
Traffic like we’re experiencing now is a soul killer. More than a casino, or a convention, or a suburban football team, it is quality of life, on a day-to-day basis, that will be key to Chicago’s re-emergence as a glorious place to live.
— Dave Hartney, Chicago
Don’t settle for mediocracy
While I support the idea that everyone deserves an equal chance and that discrimination based on gender or race should not be allowed, I’m afraid three words are not helping the situation: equity, diversity and inclusion.
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The result of the DEI push is causing schools and businesses to value mediocracy more than excellence. I may be an idealist, but I think our country has made much progress in overcoming these discrimination issues without sacrificing our push for excellence, so let’s not settle for mediocracy when we can and should do better and frankly may need to if we want to remain a great country.
— Dan Schuchardt, Glen Ellyn
An antidote to racism
Sadly, racism in America is a natural as baseball and apple pie. This is true because its core is rooted in our evolutionary instincts for survival. How so? Early humans kept to their own clan and avoided strangers and those outside of their immediate community. Even today, on a darkened street, we tend to be leerier and more suspicious of those of a different race or nationality moving toward us.
The best antidote to racism is personal experience with different races in your communities. When you live or work or worship in proximity to those of a different race, stereotypes and negative myths start to dissolve. This is one reason why the latest statistics on the prevalence of segregated neighborhoods is so disheartening. Data shows that most major metropolitan regions are more segregated now than they were more than 30 years ago, according to the University of California at Berkeley’s Othering and Belonging Institute.
Until our society is more integrated, the scourge of racial bias will remain intractable and highly difficult to eradicate.
— Ken Derow, Swarthmore, Pennsylvania
The bravery of journalists
The arrest and detainment of Evan Gershkovich shows the true bravery of journalists, who go into the most dangerous and unstable parts of the world to report the truth of what is occurring. His being detained shows what happens when truth is spoken to power, inspiring fear in leaders who would have that quashed.
Gershkovich and others are inspiring in showing how to offer oneself in service to others. I am glad our country’s leaders have deemed his incarceration as “wrongfully detained,” and in uniting over that, hopefully Gershkovich will be released soon and safely.
— Mandy May, Evanston
A cascade of effects
Results of gun violence: colostomy bags. Crutches. Blindness. Loss of use of a limb. Nightmares. Hearing loss. Wheelchairs. Paraplegia. Anxiety. Decreased lung function. Loss of bladder control. Quadriplegia. Depression. Balance issues. Braces. Neuroses. Limping. Chronic pain. Decreased socialization. Constant fear. Body, limb and facial disfigurement. Insomnia. Chronic wound care. Infertility. Malnutrition. Difficulty concentrating. Etcetera.
— Sam Solomon, Deerfield
Sacrificing our children
Some day in the future, this period of time will be called the “Barbaric Times” because we are OK with sacrificing our children in the name of gun rights.
Thank you to Heidi Stevens for the column “It’s guns that are laying waste to our children” (April 9). Also, let’s reflect on the Indiana legislature honoring the National Rifle Association just one day after the Louisville, Kentucky, mass shooting.
— Ann Marie Jagiella, Orland Park
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