Recent Streetsblog CHICAGO posts about Roger Romanelli

Deconstructing the Misleading Info in an Ashland-Western Coalition Flyer

By John Greenfield | Sep 3, 2013 | 68 Comments

Here’s a flyer from the anti-bus rapid transit group the Ashland-Western Coalition, which I came across today at a café on Ashland Avenue in the East Village. The AWC is a consortium of business and community groups on the Near West Side, led by Roger Romanelli, executive director of the Randolph/Fulton Market Association. Let’s take […]

Ashland Bus Rapid Transit NIMBYs Cling to Anonymity

By John Greenfield | Aug 21, 2013 | 57 Comments

After I wrote about a June 25 meeting of the anti-bus rapid transit group the Ashland-Western Coalition, Roger Romanelli, executive director of the Randolph/Fulton Market Association, emailed me with some objections. “You incorrectly name me as the leader of the Ashland-Western Coalition, and I seek a retraction,” he wrote. “Our group is a volunteer coalition, […]

Don’t Be Fooled: Ashland-Western Coalition Is Against “Modern” Bus Service

By John Greenfield | Aug 7, 2013 | 90 Comments

While the CTA goes forward with the environmental analysis and conceptual engineering phase of designing the first 5.4-mile stretch of bus rapid transit on Ashland Avenue, the NIMBY crowd is also on the move. On August 1, the Gazette community newspaper ran their second tone-deaf anti-BRT editorial in two months. This time, they lumped the Ashland […]

Ashland Bus Rapid Transit NIMBYs Try to Win Over Aldermen

By John Greenfield | Jun 27, 2013 | 64 Comments

The BRT NIMBYs are at it again. In January, the Ashland-Western Coalition, a consortium of chambers of commerce and community development groups on the Near West Side, hosted a public meeting where business owners panicked that the CTA’s plan to build bus rapid transit on Ashland would ruin them. Earlier this month the coalition announced […]