A win for the Archer Avenue traffic safety project supporters: The “Archer Avengers” Astroturfed opposition seems to have called it quits
Monday was [checks notes] round 29 of the weekly rallies about the Archer Avenue Complete Streets project in Brighton Park, which has the goal of making walking, biking, riding buses, and driving safer and more efficient. These events, which have taken place virtually every Monday since December 8 during the evening rush, happen in front of or near the office of Ald. Julia Ramirez (12th), a progressive who supports the initiative.
The rallies were actually launched by opponents of the project. They’ve been promoted by the “moderate to conservative,” pro-charter school lobbying group Urban Center, founded by perennial candidate Paul Vallas and currently led by previously disgraced, Trump-friendly CEO Juan Rangel. In a recent Tribune interview, Rangel made it fairly obvious that the main purpose of these demonstrations was to help elect Ramirez’s challenger Claudia Zuno, a protest regular, in the upcoming aldermanic elections.
Zuno at the February 9 demonstration, one week before she announced her candidacy. Photo: John Greenfield
From the get-go, Archer project supporters, nearly all of them Southwest Siders and almost none of them previously involved in local politics, showed up to counter-protest. So there have been several months of weekly dueling rallies.
That stopped after June 5, when Chicago Department of Transportation Complete Streets Planner Riley O’Neil was fatally “doored” in a non-protected bike lane on Halsted Street in Bridgeport, just a few miles up the road from Brighton Park. O’Neil’s death would not have happened if he had been riding in a curbside protected bike lane.
In the wake of that tragedy, the 12th Ward project opponents, who call themselves the “Archer Guardians,” stopped showing up to demonstrate near Ramirez office. Perhaps they finally realized that opposing lifesaving infrastructure for political gain is a bad look. In contrast, the project boosters have kept holding rallies, and the event last Monday, June 29, seemed to draw the largest crowd in recent weeks, despite temperatures in the mid-nineties.
“Today we’re just out here doing another Safe Streets rally,” said rally co-organizer Alfredo Villadares Jr., who lives in nearby Gage Park. “I’m hoping that we don’t have to come out her and keep having to do these. I’m hoping the neighborhood kind of opens their eyes to the benefits that the project is going to be giving them once it’s completed. Because as we all know, the project isn’t completed.”
He wasn’t sure whether or not that would be the last rally. “To be honest with you, I’ve always said that we’re out her because the ‘Archer Avengers’ [his nickname for the Archer Guardians] are out here,” Valladares said. “The voice of reason says these rallies shouldn’t be necessary, because everyone in the neighborhood should want to be safe. So as long as there isn’t a group out here, spreading misinformation, I don’t feel the need to be out here.”
Was there anything else he wanted to say? “It’s be a long seven months,” Villadares responded. Indeed, they been out there in everything from sub-freezing weather to 94-degree temperatures, so they’ve definitely earned their cred.
I asked Villadares’ fellow rally organizer Gil “Pookie” Campos, a lifelong Brighton Park resident, for his perspective on the significance of the latest rally. “I was talking to Alfredo that the reason that we came out here was because there were people who were going to protest against the new safety infrastructure. And my whole point was, ‘You know what, I’m for it so I’m going to come out there and just anti-protest.'”
“And it just grew from there,” Campos said. “I just keep thinking that all the negative vibes that [the opponents] kept putting out, and all the mean comments that they would say on social media, and I would just ignore it. And now it’s like they just gave up, and I feel like we can just move away from all that negativity, and let all the new infrastructure get built, so that everyone can see the statistics, that there are fewer crashes on Archer.”
McKinley Park resident Tony Adams has also been a regular rally attendee. “We’re celebrating the fact that we’re the only ones here,” he said. “I just feel kind of triumphant, like we’ve won. Even though we’d already won, because the bike lanes are here and they’re a fact. They’re going to help keep the street safe. I the opposition has more-and-more been exposed as partisan, driven by forces that aren’t necessarily local to the neighborhood. One of their main arguments is that they’re grass roots, but they’re actually Astroturfed.”
Aida Flores is an elementary school assistant principal who is currently running for alder of the 25th Ward, which includes parts of University Village, Pilsen, and Little Village. She had stopped by the 12th Ward office, and also spent time at the rally. She said she supports the cause.
Flores told me she has spent her whole life in Pilsen, and when she was a kid, cycling was very common in the neighborhood. She has encouraging her kids to ride by having family bike rides. “We just started hosting them once a month on Blue Island Avenue at the McDonald’s, and we started to have all these different community members from across the city [including Valladares and Campos] coming in and joining us,” she said. “They started collaborating with us and sharing their concerns, so we came out to support them here.” She added that Campos has helped with her family routes by teaching the kids bicycle hand signals, and suggesting good routes to the Lakefront Trail. “It’s great to be able to teach the kids how to be safe, and also how to enjoy their city,” Flores said.
McKinley Park resident and longtime rally attendee Andrew Spalding said he would like local sustainable transportation advocates’ next project to be encouraging CDOT to finish the Southwest Side Neighborhood Bike Network. “That should span all the way from Bridgeport to Archer Heights, and through Gage Park and Back of the Yards as well” he said. “Just hoping to see that happen in the next couple of years.”
Archer project supporter Sal Moreno said he’s been involved with many different aspects of our city’s cycling community, including previously working at West Town Bikes, and drives as well as rides bikes. “As a cyclist, I’ve had to ride in Chicago way before any of these lanes, and having to learn to dodge cars is not for everybody,” he explained. “I don’t think people should have to learn to dodge a speeding car just so they can get home. Having seen the protected lanes come up, I haven’t seen a huge difference in traffic, aside from the [major utilities project area southwest of the rallies.]”
“I’ve had way too many close calls on my bike, especially over at Western Avenue,” Moreno added. “I’m just tired of having to watch out for myself, watch out for my partner [Arielle Acevedo, who was with him.] Having seen people get taken out before, it’s not a great feeling.”
Acevedo shared that sentiment. “As someone who has lived all my life on the South Side, it’s good to finally see bike infrastructure here on the South Side, and get treated just like the North Side,” she said. “We deserve safe streets.”
Read CDOT’s FAQ about the Archer / Kedzie traffic safety projects here.
Materials about Archer Avenue can be found here.
Materials about Kedzie Avenue can be found here.
Read Streetsblog Chicago’s writeup of Round 1 of the dueling Archer rallies, 12/8/25, here.
Check out our article about Round 2, 12/15/25, here.
Read SBC’s coverage of Round 3, 12/22/25, here.
Read our article about Round 4, 12/29/25 here.
Check our post about Round 5, 1/5/26 here.
Take a look at our assessment of Round 6, 1/12/26, here.
Read SBC’s post about Round 7, 1/19/26, here.
Take a gander at our article about Round 8, 1/26/26, here.
Check out our article that mentions Round 10, 2/9/26, here.
Peruse out writeup of Round 11, 2/16/26, here.
Read our article about Round 12, 2/23/26, here.
Take a look at our post about Round 13, 3/2/26, here.
View a couple of images from Round 16, 3/23/26 on Bluesky and Twitter.
Take a look at our post about Round 17, 3/30/26, here.
Check out a quick report on Round 19, 4/13/26, from the Archer project advocates here.
Read our report on Round 20, 4/20/26, here.
Read about Ald. Ramirez’s announcement of design changes on 4/24/26 here.
Read about the opponent’s morning press conference on 4/27/26 here. (The supporters didn’t hold a rally that day due to the possibility of severe storms.)
Read a short update about Round 23, 5/18/25 here.
Check out our May 28 article about politics behind the Archer protests here.
Peruse our June 1 featuring Ald. Byron Sigcho-Lopez (25th) take on the issue.
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