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Burt, Deliver Us from Tour Buses

42nd Ward Alderman Burt Natarus loves to cozy to local business interests. But when idling tour buses take over your neighborhood, you have to draw the line somewhere. Today I wrote Natarus to tell him so.

The World Thinks Chicago Is a World City, So Why Don’t Most Chicagoans Think So, Too?

New Yorkers and Chicagoans both know they have a good thing going in their respective cities. So why do Chicagoans feel like they have to justify their city all the time?

Your Friend, 820 ILCS 115

Yours Truly having just filed a Wage Claim against a nonprofit English-as-a-Second-Language school in Pilsen, a former part-time employer, for pay deliberately and illegally withheld, I think it time to meditate on the best friend an Illinois hourly worker ever had–the Illinois Wage Payment and Collection Act.

Stupid Daley Tricks #1

I’m no knee-jerk fan of da mare, though I will say he’s finally an out-of-the-closet urbanist. However, the latest affront to the legacy of Daniel Burnham’s 1909 Plan of Chicago speaks for itself. At least through the incisive words of Tribune architecture critic Blair Kamin.

Suburbasaurus!

You see them coming. You try to get away. But somehow you’re always ensnared. They surround you, guidebooks open and maps flailing in the wind, and ask you that dreaded question, ‘Excuse me, can you tell me how to get to Navy Pier?’

Marina City Myths

Ok. Let’s get this all out of the way up front so that we can proceed to other topics. You know you want to know. You’ll be happier, I’ll be happier, Bertrand Goldberg will be happier. Answers to the most-asked questions about my humble abode, Marina City.