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I lived in Chicago for a dozen years, but that was a decade ago. Lots has changed, I noticed as I moved around the city today. The 2012 murder rate gets the news attention, of course, but my view was a longer one as I compared memories to current realities.

Some changes are depressing, as reflected on Printer’s Row (Dearborn Street between Harrison and Congress). In the last century, when the large Chicago printers succumbed to new technology, their multi-floor press factories were replaced by antique stores, independent booksellers and small pubs. None remain, now replaced in their turn by chain stores catering the the student population in the area.

Many areas, though, have gone through a wonderful transition. In the same area as Printer’s Row, on the other side of the University of Illinois at Chicago, Little Italy continues to become very trendy in a lasting, tasteful way. The apartments look appealing, and core restaurants of Tuscany and Rosebud have offspring throughout the city.

The Daley’s were no strangers to the use of eminent domain, but the results are inarguable. Millennium Park provides a space that Grant Park never achieved on its own, and I’m looking forward to what has become of Meigs Field, the corporate airstrip on Northerly Island that is now the locale for a concert venue I’ll be visiting tomorrow night (that’s a blog teaser, assuming you don’t have internet service).

Some things should never change, and the famous Chicago Italian beef sandwich has not (I had the sausage beef combo, with hot peppers, for lunch). I still look for the Vienna Beef logo when I come into Chicago!

This entry was posted on July 16, 2012 at 10:06 pm and is filed under Travel with tags Chicago Italian beef, Chicago printers row. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.