Lawrence Avenue streetscape

Last year, Streetsblog USA's Angie Schmitt demonstrated how a new feature of Google Street View can be used to highlight street remix projects that have made cities more livable. Google now lets you look at archived Street View images, so it's easy to compare what streets looked like before and after they were reconfigured.

Divvy bike-share stations were designed to be easy to move around, with their modular construction and off-grid solar power. Sure enough, plenty of Divvy members have had their routines disrupted by station moves lately: 8,000 Divvy members received word this year that stations they'd recently used were on the move. One Divvy member forwarded two such emails to Streetsblog and asked why the stations had to be moved, since the new locations didn't seem any more convenient than the prior locations.

The long-awaited Lawrence streetscape and road diet is is almost complete, and the project has already transformed a corridor that had been unpleasant for pedestrians and cyclists into a much more livable street. Meanwhile, construction is also wrapping up on a new, supersized Metra station house on Lawrence.

Three years after the Chicago Department of Transportation presented renderings and details about a proposal to narrow Lawrence Avenue between Clark Street and Western Avenue in Lincoln Square, construction began in June despite late opposition from business owners.

Business owners in Lincoln Square are whining that the upcoming Lawrence Avenue streetscape, which involves removing travel lanes, will cause traffic jams and hurt sales. The irony is, they're currently reaping the benefits of a longstanding road diet on Lincoln Avenue. The new project will transform Lawrence between Clark Street and Western Avenue from it’s current status as a four-lane speedway with narrow sidewalks to a safer, more pleasant, more economically viable corridor.