The City of Chicago replaced a bridge on a principal north-south street and opened it up to traffic a week ago...but then it closed the next bridge south for five months:
The Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT) on Friday is opening the new Halsted Street Bridge over the Chicago River North Branch Canal, which has been closed since November 30, 2010 for reconstruction. The new tied-arch bridge will feature two full traffic lanes in each direction—up from the current one lane in each direction—as well as marked bike lanes in each direction, a configuration that will improve traffic flow and safety for motorists and bicyclists.
In addition to reconstructing the bridge, CDOT resurfaced Halsted from south of Division Street to North Branch Street and replaced 20 streetlights. CDOT will add 94 architectural lighting elements by the end of January 2012 and will also resurface the intersection of Division and Halsted in the Spring. The cost of the project will be $13.6 million.
As this bridge opens, CDOT will move to close the Halsted Street Bridge over the North Branch of the Chicago River to start a major repair project that will be completed by May 2012.
Seriously? They couldn't leave the road open for a week?
Here's the affected area:
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Remember the three-year-old parking meter privatization that will be former mayor Richard Daley's best-remembered legacy? In another example of how not to negotiate a deal, it turns out the city agreed to pay the parking meter company for lost revenues under what should have been eminently predictable circumstances:
Financial statements for the company show that CPM has billed the city an additional $2,191,326 in “True-up Revenue” through the end of 2010.
Under the contract, the city is given an 8% annual allowance for required meter closures in the Central Business District, and a 4% allowance everywhere else. After the annual allowance is exceeded, any metered space(s) closed for more than six hours in a day or for six total hours over three consecutive days, the city must pay the meter company for the lost revenue from that metered space(s) for that entire day.
In other words, if the metered space is closed for six hours, the city is on the hook for the estimated revenue for the total number of hours the meter is in operation. Most meters are in operation no less than 13 hours a day.
Remember that the city council voted on the 500-page contract only a few hours after receiving a copy. The city leased the meters for $1.16 bn, almost $3 bn less than a conservative cash-flow analysis suggested at the time and $7-8 bn less than high-end estimates.
In Chicago, we joke about how much we tolerate small-scale local corruption. The parking meter lease violated even that standard; the council should abrogate the deal, and investigate why it happened in the first place. Of course, I think we already know the answer to that: some people got really rich off it. And taxpayers in Chicago got screwed.
I'm still banging away at software today—why is this damn socket exception thrown under small loads?—so I only have a minute to post some stuff I found interesting:
- Chicago and the State of Illinois are planning the largest urban park in the world in the mostly-abandoned Lake Calumet and South Works areas of the south side.
- It looks like the far-right has hijacked Hungary's government, in the way that right-wing governments do, which should remind everyone who lives in a democracy how fragile the form of government can be.
- The Atlantic's Ta-Nahesi Coates has one of the best definitions of bigotry I've encountered: "The bigot is never to blame. Always is he besieged--by gays and their radical agenda, by women and their miniskirts, by fleet-footed blacks. It is an ideology of 'not my fault.' "
- I have tentatively decided that Facebook's Timeline feature is cool, while at the same time recognizing how it once again makes it harder for average users to control the privacy of their data on the site.
More updates as events warrant.
I'm juggling a couple of clients today, so I can't write entire entries on any of these:
OK, back to the mines...
Former Chicago mayor Rich Daley got named to Coke's board of directors today. Coca-Cola said:
"Mr. Daley brings significant public policy expertise and experience in creating sustainable growth opportunities for businesses and communities to our Company," said Muhtar Kent, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of The Coca-Cola Company. "His experience and insights will be invaluable as we continue to work to grow our business and invest in the fabric of the communities we serve."
Daley is also a senior advisor to JPMorgan Chase, where he will chair the new "Global Cities Initiative," a joint project of JPMorgan Chase and the Brookings Institution to help cities identify and leverage their greatest economic development resources. He also serves as a senior fellow at the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago.
I wonder how long this was in the works? And how long has he advised JPMC, the bank that negotiated our catastrophic parking-meter deal?
Even though we still have two weeks to go, 2011 has already experienced the costliest year of weather disasters in decades:
From extreme drought, heat waves and floods to unprecedented tornado outbreaks, hurricanes, wildfires and winter storms, a record 12 weather and climate disasters in 2011 each caused $1 billion or more in damages — and most regrettably, loss of human lives and property.
The Illinois State Climatologist adds:
We also experienced some $50 billion in total losses for the year. And that is with a fairly quiet hurricane season. Some of those billion dollar disasters had direct impacts on Illinois, including the February blizzard, and the spring flooding.
NOAA has art:
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For photos from the first weather disaster of 2011, check out our archives.
A client visit up in Manitowoc, Wis., ended a little earlier than planned today, so I was able to:
- Avoid rush-hour traffic in both Milwaukee and Chicago;
- Pick Parker up tonight instead of tomorrow; and
- Snap this photo from the roof of the Lincoln Park Whole Foods:
We finally got our first measurable snowfall of the 2011-12 winter:
It's official. We got our first measurable snow early this morning. O'Hare reported 13 mm of fresh snow. 2011 now ties 1948 as the year with the 5th latest first measurable snow for a winter season. We now join more than a third of the country with snow cover. The National Snow Analysis from the National Operational Hydrologic Remote Sensing Center reports that as of yesterday, 37.3% of the US had snow cover with an average depth of 45 mm.
I like how almost all of Illinois is snow-free, except for that tiny bit around Chicago. Hm. Anyway, it looks like La Niña is doing its thing this year, so we will probably have a warmer, wetter winter than usual. As long as it doesn't look like this.
Finally. In Chicago, anyway. The farther north you go, the more likely your latest sunset is...earlier.
I explained why this happens December 8th a few years ago. And yet, I feel the need to comment on it yet again...
Chicago might get measurable snowfall tonight, which would be the fourth-latest first fall in history and the first since April 18th:
Though flurries have been observed within the city limits four times this month and seven times since the snow season began this year on Nov. 9, the only "measurable snow" which has fallen has been across the northern suburbs.
That may change as a light-snow-generating disturbance swings across the metro area Thursday night. The system's approach will become more and more evident Thursday as sunshine is filtered by an influx of clouds out ahead of the disturbance's light snow, particularly Thursday afternoon and evening.
But:
If there's a snowstorm in Chicago's future the next two weeks, there is NO computer model consensus on it at this point. That can change fairly quickly this time of year. But for now, Thursday night's wave of light snowfall is the only definitive snow threat the metro area faces in the short term.