transit-oriented development
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How Parking Requirements Get in the Way of New Chicago Businesses
A proposal to legalize transit-oriented development would make it easier to build walkable and bikeable neighborhoods, in part by halving the car parking requirement for residences and eliminating it for non-residential uses near train stations. The ordinance is set to go before aldermen at the zoning committee's next meeting in September. Right now, without the ordinance, launching a new business that complies with Chicago's parking minimums can be a ludicrous ordeal. Here's what two business owners in Logan Square had to go through to get around their parking minimums.
August 6, 2013
Chicago Can Do Much More to Legalize Transit-Oriented Development
Mayor Rahm Emanuel introduced an ordinance last Wednesday that would reduce some barriers to transit-oriented development in Chicago, lowering parking requirements and allowing more density near transit stations. While the proposal is a step forward, there's much more the city can do to ensure that future growth leads to more walking and transit use, not more traffic and congestion.
July 31, 2013
Rumor Mill: New Ordinance Seeks to Legalize Transit-Oriented Development
Last week I interviewed Jacky Grimshaw about the Center for Neighborhood Technology's recent report on Chicago's lack of transit-oriented development compared to our peer cities. Afterward, I was thinking about the reconstruction of the entire Red Line south of Roosevelt, which will replace tracks and renovate many stations. This project is going to significantly speed up transit, but are there policies in place to incentivize development near these nine stations where riders will be able to get downtown faster?
July 16, 2013
Can Chicagoland Fix Its Sprawl Problem?
Earlier this week we wrote up the Center for Neighborhood Technology's report about how the Chicagoland region is falling behind other major American metro areas when it comes to focusing growth near transit stations. In Philadelphia, San Francisco, DC, and New York, most new housing is being built close to transit, but not in Chicago. Here, most growth is happening outside of walking distance to transit, and the "transit shed" is losing jobs faster than the car-dependent areas of the region.
July 12, 2013
Report: Chicago Falling Behind Peer Cities on Transit-Oriented Growth
Transit-oriented development in the Chicago region is falling behind cities like Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and San Francisco, according to a report released in May by the Center for Neighborhood Technology, a local "think and do tank." In "Transit-Oriented Development in the Chicago Region" [PDF], CNT warns that Chicago's failure to focus housing and jobs near transit is creating additional financial burdens for households who have no choice but to shoulder the costs of car ownership.
July 9, 2013
Yes, It Can Be Done: 99 New Apartments With No Parking
While I was browsing Andrew Salzberg's map showing how much development is allowed near transit stops, I noticed a dark spot -- a site where a taller building is allowed -- at the southwest corner of Ashland Avenue and Division Street. Then I remembered the development underway there, the "1601 Tower," on the site of a shuttered Pizza Hut restaurant. The interesting thing about this 11-story, 99-unit building is that it will provide no car parking spaces for residents.
February 21, 2013