I have a hard time wrapping my head around some aspects of the Robert Taylor Homes area in Southside Chicago. One being space. Pictured is one of several empty lots. This is a huge lot. It could eat up 3, maybe 4 Shaw blocks. If this thing were in Shaw, It’d be a dog park by now, it is so, so big.
Maybe that’s another thing I noticed about Chicago, space. All that space, even in other neighborhoods. Chicago has a lot of parks. Open wide spaces, maybe a ball field thrown in for good measure. A city so spacious it includes dull boring un-fabulous to downright tacky middle class neighborhoods that could be a suburb, but no, you’re still in the city limits.
Space is at such a premium around the District that I was struck by the wealth of space in some of the most poverty stricken areas of Chicago.