Yesterday's CBS Chicago report by Jermont Terry, "Brighton Park neighbors upset with traffic impact from bike lane project on Archer Avenue," is a great example of how not to do a story about a traffic safety project. Not only does it fail to tell the full story about the purpose of the initiative, and basically solely gives airtime to the opponents, but it also contains an embarrassing factual error.
You can get up to speed on what the City is building on Archer from our coverage of a recent community meeting hosted by local Ald. Julia Ramirez (12th) and the Chicago Department of Transportation. But in a nutshell, the department is doing a Complete Streets overhaul of 1.9 miles of Archer between 47th Street and Western Avenue. Meanwhile, they're doing a similar project on1.9 mile stretch of Kedzie between Archer and 28th Street.
Let's walk through the CBS report and deconstruct what's wrong with it.
"Residents in Brighton Park said their side streets and alleys are overflowing with traffic, as drivers look to get around backups on Archer Avenue after the Chicago Department of Transportation installed new bike lanes," the piece begins. "Many in Brighton Park... are not happy with the end result that will reduce Archer Avenue from four lanes to two."
For starters, the project is not halving the number of lanes available to drivers – there will still ne three available. It's taking a crash-prone four-lane "stroad" and doing a "four-to-three conversion," a street redesign strategy endorsed by the AARP for creating safer conditions. Yes, motorists will have fewer through lanes, which will help calm traffic and discourage speeding. But in exchange, the third lane will be converted to a dedicate left turn lane, making it safer and easier for drivers to make a turn, without forcing other motorists behind them wait or switch lanes.
And this initiative is not just about "install[ing] new bike lanes," although it's great that the most direct diagonal cycling route from the Southwest Side to Downtown will get physical protection. Rather, the idea behind a Complete Streets project is to make the corridor safer for all road users, also including people walking, taking transit and, yes, driving.
In addition to the traffic calming and turn lanes, which will lead to fewer car crashes, nearly all pedestrian crossings will get a pedestrian signal, marked crosswalk, and/or curb extensions and crossing islands. Bus boarding islands will enable operators to pick up customers without having to pull back and forth from the curb, speeding trips.
The safety improvements are crucial, because there have been far too many serious fatal pedestrian and bike crashes on Archer since 2020, including the deaths of at least four senior citizens.
"Archer Avenue is often packed with traffic, but recently parts of the road became blocked as the city began installing bike lanes," reporter Jermont Terry continued. Yep, at the recent community meeting, CDOT Complete Streets Manager Brad Huss acknowledged the area is still a construction zone, which requires temporarily narrower mixed-traffic lanes to make room for for safe work zones. However, when the work is finished, the lanes will be widened again.
"Construction is a hassle and a change," Huff said. "[But] based on all of the data and all of the concerns we’ve heard over the years, these are big changes that we feel are necessary to make [Archer and Kedzie] safer."
In his report on complaints about Archer, which does not even include the word "Kedzie," Terry said drivers are trying to avoid the construction hassles on the main street by detouring onto side streets and even alleys. "Video shows backups that neighbors said have been happening daily since the city started installing the bike lanes in the middle of winter." The CBS segment includes a video of a line of drivers in an alley, posted on Facebook by Brighton Park resident Gloria Damian. TV viewers would assume the alley is off Archer.
But in her Facebook video post, Damian mentioned that the alley is not off Archer: "This is what's happening in front of my garage everyday since Kedzie [emphasis added] turned into a one-lane street." So Terry was apparently confused when he chose to include her clip in his report about Archer.
Moreover, Damian acknowledged in the Facebook comments that the cortege-like line of cars in the alley has not just "been happening daily since the city started installing the bike lanes," as Terry claimed.
"This is not new," commented Damian's neighbor Florentino Soto Jr. on her Facebook post. "This has been happening for years. I live three houses from where this video was taken."
"Agree, not new," Damian admitted. "But not this bad."
After the Terry shows the Kedzie alley video, longtime Brighton Park resident Daniel Patlan says, "You're creating a problem that wasn't there before." Again, that problem was there before the Complete Streets construction started.
8th District Police Council member Jason Huff told Terry the council "is concerned with emergency vehicles navigating around [redesigned] Archer Ave."
CDOT has previously checked in with local fire departments on planned street remixes. And multiple first responders have told Streetsblog they're unaware of protected bike lanes causing any issues for ambulance and firetruck drivers. That makes sense, because curbside PBLs aren't more of an obstruction than curbside parked cars.
"This is something self-made, and it's an issue that doesn't need to be happening," Patlan said.
The only non-opponent included in the CBS segment is Ald. Ramirez. In a statement, she mentioned the recent community meeting, and noted that the work is not just about building bikeways. "Archer Complete Streets project is about creating the safety infrastructure for motorists, pedestrians and cyclists," she said. "Our office is committed to upholding that safety."
But Terry didn't bother to check in with civilians who also support the Archer and Kedzie plans. On a Streetsblog Facebook post about them. Florentino Soto Jr. commented, "Other projects that share similarities with the Kedzie and Archer projects have yielded positive results," and posted the following image from the recent CDOT presentation
"I cross Archer several times a day walking the dog and i cannot wait for this project to be completed," Tweeted Anthony Moser.
"If y'all respected bikes and pedestrians his wouldn't be necessary," commented Joaquin D. Campos on Facebook.
Southwest Collective cofounder Dixon Galvez-Searle had this reaction to the CBS report. "Rush-hour congestion has been an unfortunate fact of life in Brighton Park for decades, and the combination of construction and snowfall is aggravating the situation," he said. "Residents are understandably frustrated, but we’re optimistic that this project, once it’s completed in mid-January, will make the street better for everybody."
"This new street design was developed by the city in response to a sharp increase in crashes – an average of more than 1,500 per year in Brighton Park since 2020 – and a clear response from residents who ranked traffic safety as a major neighborhood priority in surveys conducted by the city and by the 12th Ward office," he added.
"Driving down Archer in the middle of the afternoon today, I was reminded of the features of the road that made traffic miserable and compromised everybody’s safety, way before this project started," Galvez-Searle said. "Pinch points at multiple intersections where drivers needed to merge into a single lane before fanning back out into two, constant left turns from the driving lanes against oncoming traffic, and very little in the way of accommodations for pedestrians and cyclists."
"We believe Archer is for everybody, whether you’re walking, waiting for the bus, biking, or driving," Galvez-Searle concluded. "Once this project is complete, we’re hopeful that features like dedicated left turn lanes, pedestrian refuge islands, and protected bike lanes will do what they are intended to do: sharply reduce the volume of crashes in Brighton Park and make for a safer, more welcoming Archer for everybody using the street."
CBS Chicago and Jermot Terry, please take note.
Watch "Brighton Park neighbors upset with traffic impact from bike lane project on Archer Avenue,"
Materials about Archer Avenue can be found here.
Materials about Kedzie Avenue can be found here.
On November 12, SBC launched our 2026 fund drive to raise $50K through ad sales and donations. That will complete next year's budget, at a time when it's tough to find grant money. Big thanks to all the readers who have chipped in so far to help keep this site rolling all next year! Currently, we're at $4,685, with $45,315 to go, ideally by the end of February.
If you value our livable streets reporting and advocacy, please consider making a tax-exempt end-of-year gift here. If you can afford a contribution of $100 or more, think of it as a subscription. That will help keep the site paywall-free for people on tighter budgets, as well as decision-makers. Thanks for your support!
– John Greenfield, editor
