Post mortem

The dark "L" flag flying high in the rain above the scoreboard at Wrigley Field yesterday afternoon said it all. It had been a bad day for Chicago. What bagan as a sunny day filled with hope and promise, at least for half of Chicago's citizens, ended prematurely around 11:00 am when IOC president Jacques Rogge declared that "Chicago will NOT host the 2016 Olympic Games". As then as if on cue, it began to rain.

It was tough given the fact that Chicago had been eliminated in the first round of voting. But Rogge's very words were particularly brutal, couldn't he at least have said, in Miss America style: "And the third runner up is... CHICAGO!!!"

Now it's time for analysis and finger pointing. We were too arrogant, the president didn't do enough, or the president did too much, or the mayor was just, well he was just being himself.

The fact is, the selection of Rio de Janeiro to host the 2016 Games was simply in the cards. All they had to do was convince the IOC that they could deal with their own staggering crime problem, which incidentally make's Chicago's look like Mayberry. Obviously they succeeded. As for the early exit, I've read accounts that since Chicago was the odds on favorite, the early votes that may have gone here went to Tokyo and Madrid as sympathy votes. There was simply no way either of those cities would have been selected. It seems that from the outset we didn't have much of a chance either.

I predicted correctly two days ago that in the case of defeat, the critics would say that the money spent trying to get the Games was wasted, that it should have been spent on the schools or other worthwhile goals, not by trying to get some silly games in order to fulfill the mayor's legacy. Well I agree that fixing the schools is definitely more worthwhile than the Olympics. And I don't think anyone, including the mayor, would disagree.

In fact I bet you that if the mayor had a genie that granted him only one of two specific wishes, either getting the Olympics, or having a first class school system where every child enrolled in the Chicago Public Schools would get a decent education, graduate from high school, then go on to lead a healthy and productive life, that he would choose the latter in the blink of an eye.

Imagine what a legacy that would be!

The problem is there are no genies. As difficult as getting the Olympics proved to be, fixing the problem of education in the city is infinitely more difficult. It is not a problem that can be fixed simply by throwing money at it, as some would believe.

Many have pointed to two tragedies in the past week, one on the south side and one on the north side, where teenagers were attacked by mobs of kids and beaten, one to death, the other, just to the brink. The mayor should have been at home dealing with these problems they say. Personally I don't blame the mayor or the schools for that matter, for the homicidal behavior of some of our city's children.

Nor do I blame him for the deep financial morass that Chicago, the State of Illinois, the United States, and the rest of the world are in at the moment.

The truth is that a mayor simply cannot fix all the problems of a city by himself. Many things have to change before poor education, poverty, crime, in that order, are fixed.

The vision of our mayor, and many others in this city is that opportunity is the key to begin to heal our city's problems. The Olympic bid was an effort to bring opportunity to this city. The failure to bring home the Games was in the end, not at all a failure in the big picture. I truly believe that we cannot continue being a great city without looking forward, and without being connected to the rest of the world. This bid, regardless of the outcome was a step in the right direction. It showed the rest of the world that we are willing to do the things necessary to bring us in step with world, and not to just to rest on our laurels, on our great architecture and beautiful lakefront.

I applaud the hard work and dedication that went into this effort. Today is a new day and we have lots of work to do. We can handle this setback because we Chicagoans have had lots of them. Just look at our sports teams for starters.

Some folks think that following sports is a big waste of time. But any Chicago sports fan can tell you that this endeavor prepares one for many of the hardships of life.

So in the end, on the day after our defeat in Copenhagen, I as a Chicagoan can proudly say, "Wait 'till next year!"

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Post mortem

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Legacy and the Olympics

As I begin to write this there are two days until the International Olympic Committee makes its choice for the host city of the 2016 Summer Olympic Games. For the first time in my life I live in a city that is in contention to host the Games and like most people in this town, I am filled with excitement, and not a little ambivalence.


Putting myself on the line I'll go on record right now and say that Madrid is not going to be the one as the 2012 Olympics will be in London and the I.O.C. is loathe to have consecutive Games on the same continent. The same will probably be the problem for Tokyo as the 2008 games were in Beijing and the I.O.C. likes to spread the wealth around, at least among four continents so far. My money, if I had any right now, would be on Rio as the Games have never taken place in South America. And what Games they would be! But Rio has its problems too so it looks like Chicago and Rio are running neck and neck. We'll know in less than 48 hours.



I'm sure there are detractors in every city that tries to get the Olympics and Chicago certainly is no exception. The criticisms run from the mundane, (it would tie up traffic for two weeks), to doubts about whether we can really pull it off and at what cost.


I stated my support a few months ago on this blog for the effort to bring the Olympics to Chicago and I stand by that. There are good reasons not to bring the Games here, most notably the vast expense and the possible loss or alteration of significant buildings and parks. I believe however that there are simply more good reasons in favor. In the long run, and it may in fact be the VERY long run, the benefits will simply outweigh the costs.


Many of the criticisms center around Mayor Richard M. Daley. While the mayor enjoys success at the polls that no one, not even his father had, he has become the symbol for all that is wrong with city government. Admittedly Daley has exercised heavy handed authoritarian rule over the city, the most outrageous example being the destruction of Meigs Field by sending bulldozers to tear up the runway in the middle of the night. Ultimately however the mayor proved to be right on that issue, the city benefits far more by having park land along the lakefront than an airport used primarily by private planes. Charges of corruption coming out of the mayor's office (but not the mayor himself), and other misguided adventures, most recently the bungled out-sourcing of city controlled revenue sources like the Skyway and parking meters have certainly tarnished the mayor's administration.


So it's no small wonder that the mayor's almost single minded effort to pursue the Games, has appeared to many to be "Ritchie's folly". Bringing the Olympics to Chicago is really the mayor's attempt to secure his legacy, or so the argument goes.


Well what politician is not concerned about his legacy? Any public figure's legacy is indelibly tied to his or her successes and failures. If Mayor Daley leaves the city in better shape than he found it, then his legacy will be intact. And who but the most cynical among us would have a problem with that?



His vision may not be to everyone's liking but no one for a minute has ever questioned Mayor Daley's love of his city. Almost to a fault the mayor has been Chicago's greatest civic booster, never afraid to put his city in the same league with the great cities of the world.


Personally I have to admit that I cringe whenever I hear the term "world class city". It seems like a meaningless, hype-filled expression spouted by provincial bumpkins with a serious inferiority complex. But our mayor truly believes in Chicago, the world class city. And he is banking on the possibility that he may be right.


Look at the competition. Madrid with over a millennium of history, is the capital of the Spanish speaking world, a center of culture, government, and commerce. Consider Tokyo, one of the great metropolises of the world, a "command center" of the world's economy. And of course there is Rio de Janeiro, unquestionably one of the most beautiful and glamorous cities in the world. While it unquestionably applies to all three, I strongly suspect that "world class city" is seldom uttered in those cities, in whatever form it takes in Portuguese, Spanish, or Japanese.


In Chicago we rightfully extol the physical beauty our lakefront and our architecture. We are the transportation hub of the United States. The Chicago's Board of Trade and Mercantile Exchange are strong engines in our nation's economy. Many of our cultural institutions are second to none. Yet to this day traveling around the world, the first thing people say when you tell them you're from Chicago is "Gangsters!, rat a tat tat!, Al Capone!"


A local talk radio host recently asked the question, "Have you ever visited a city because they at one time hosted the Olympics?" Of course the question was pointed and everyone who called in answered no. A more reasonable question would have been, "has your image of a particular city changed because they hosted the Olympics?"

I would have to say that with the exception of Atlanta, and Athens, two cities I had already visited, I learned a great deal about all the cities that have hosted the Games in my lifetime. While Sydney, Barcelona, Seoul, Turin and Sarajevo to name a few were already on my map, my image of those places was definitely shaped by the Olympics. Not to mention the cities that I probably would have never heard of had it not been for the Olympics: Albertville and Grenoble, France, Nagano and Sapporo, Japan, Innsbruck, Austria, even Lake Placid, New York.

The Olympics have replaced World's Fairs as the single greatest showcase for a city to the rest of the world. Billions of people will be tuned in to the Games and it seems to be a no brainer that the value of that kind of publicity as far as developing international awareness, would be far greater than the simple expense of putting on the Games.

Mayor Daley understands this as do the Governor, the President, the First Lady and an entire slew of public and private figures who are in Copenhagen right now to lobby the effort.

Here at home nay sayers are dialing up their rhetoric in these final hours before the decision. Maybe their disdain comes from the fact that they don't care much for the Olympics themselves or that the boundaries their world end at the Indiana and Wisconsin borders. The bean counters and small thinkers among us have been the loudest in their criticisms and no doubt we'll be hearing a great deal from them after the decision is made around noon Chicago time on Friday, regardless of the outcome. "Now we're in for it!" they'll say if we get the Games, or "Well we sure wasted a bunch of money trying to get this thing" if we don't.

As far as I'm concerned, this has been a win/win situation for the city. Regardless of the outcome, Chicago has benefited from this endeavor in terms of exposure and securing its place on the world's stage. Perhaps, as an article I sited in an earlier post suggested, any city that bids for the Olympics benefits greatly, even more so if it is not the ultimate winner.

Like everyone else in this city, I eagerly await the news on Friday morning. Deep down I really hope we win, I think it would be a terrific experience and opportunity, especially for my children and their peers all over the city.

Chicago is a proud city with many mottos, "The City of Big Shoulders" and "The I Will City" are two of them.

As far as I know, "No, thank you" is not.

Win or lose I can summarize my feeling in four words:

Good job Mr. Mayor.

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Legacy and the Olympics

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Taking a stand

I've made a point in my adult life to carefully consider both sides of every issue and not cornering myself into any ideological corner. That's why I can't answer questions like "are you a liberal or a conservative" or "are you pro-life or pro-choice" or "what's your favorite reality show?"


I'm like Ringo Starr (definitely not my favorite Beatle) in "A Hard Day's Night" when he was asked by a reporter; "are you a mod or a rocker?" He considers it for a second and says: "I'm a mocker."


Going through some posts written in the five months since I started this blog, I've noticed that I have hardly taken a definitive position on anything. I've written things like; while it would be too bad to demolish St. Boniface, there might be no alternative or, maybe the Children's Museum in Daley Bicentennial Plaza is a good thing, maybe not.


What a dishrag!


That is why the I made a point the other day of coming out and saying that I wholeheartedly support the extension of the lakefront park to the city's borders, and highlighted it in boldface to boot.


The other day I came across a yes/no question on a forum on one of my new favorite websites "Forgotten Chicago" that asked; "are you in favor of the Olympics coming to Chicago?"


Whoa what a loaded question I thought. Honestly I've been thinking as most Chicago folks have about my answer to that question and like most, I can think of good reasons pro and good reasons con.


So I surprised myself this morning when on my bike ride to work a little light went off in my head.


"Yes..." I said to myself, "bring 'em on!"


Why, you might think would I support the mayor's boondoggle, a complete waste of time and money that promises if we are selected by the I.O.C., to tie up the city for years before the games and leave us in debt for many years after?


Good point. Wait, that's not very definitive of me.


I think Mayor Daley would have been remiss to let this opportunity slip by. Chicago didn't get to be a great city, (yes I truly believe it's a great city), by sitting back and resting on its laurels.


Detroit was once a boom town because of the automobile industry. They never expanded beyond making cars and today we see the result.


St. Louis was the most important city west of New York when they were the center of shipping on the Mississippi River. They could have continued their preeminence to this day had they done one thing, build a bridge spanning the river in the early 1850s. But because of the objections of the steamship lines they hesitated. Chicago on the other hand was heavily invested in the Illinois-Michigan Canal which connected the Great Lakes with the Mississippi. That did not prevent city officials from actively pursuing the railroads which stood to take significant business away from the Canal. In 1853 a bridge was built upstream from St. Louis connecting Davenport and Rock Island and the railroads that would ultimately cross the continent all came through Chicago, not St. Louis.


Not that hosting the Olympics will necessarily have the momentous effect of the railroads. But one never knows. I am always amazed when folks complain about forward thinking projects as being too expensive or too risky. Without people of foresight, without the risk takers, and the gamblers, Chicago would be a distant suburb of Kenosha. Sometimes we simply cannot afford NOT to take those risks.


Here's where I think the Olympics could benefit the city the most:


If done correctly, the transportation infrastructure could be greatly improved and expanded. People will need to get to and from venues and automobiles will not cut it. This will be a great opportunity to work on getting new, state of the art transportation systems jump-started, serving especially the neighborhoods on the South Side, where the major venues are planned and that are currently under served.


Again, if done correctly, improvements to the parks where the venue sights will be located can be made. Remember that Washington and Jackson Parks were the sites of the Columbian Exposition. They were returned to magnificence, (which has since faded a bit) after the Fair. I know this is wishful thinking but again let's be definitive.


The incredible visibility of the Olympics will put Chicago on the world stage in ways we can't even imagine. Yes, once more if done correctly and the Olympics come off well, the city will become a major tourist destination. Today tourists from all of the world who visit Chicago love this city. And the folks who have never been here still think that Al Capone reigns supreme. While we natives might take some perverse pride in that, it really doesn't help. We may poo poo tourism but let's face it, the factories, slaughterhouses and steel mills aren't contributing very much to the economy anymore. Tourism not only brings significant capital to the city, it also is great PR that attracts business.


These are benefits that may not be immediately realized. And there no doubt will be benefits that will not be foreseen until well after the torch is extinguished.


I do see some disheartening signs. The mayor in his single-mindedness about bringing the Games here has made some questionable policy decisions, especially related to preservation issues. I'd also like to see more focus on having venues built on the old South Works site in South Chicago rather than in Washington Park.


There I go again.


Let the record state that at 1:12am June 13, 2009, I am officially saying definitively, let the games begin.


Of course tomorrow is another day.

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Taking a stand

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