Op-Ed For The Reader: Lincoln Yards & The 78: Rahm’s Desperate Attempt to Plant his Flags in America’s Second City

Since the world’s first skyscraper — the Home Insurance building — was built in Chicago in 1884, the city has prided itself on being at the forefront of architectural development. In 1970, the plan for the Sears Tower was approved, which would be the tallest building on earth from 1973–1998. After losing the title to the Petronas Towers in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, Chicago raced to develop the 116-story tall Spire, which was first debuted in 2005 and unanimously approved by the Chicago Plan commission in 2006. The project would eventually fail for numerous reasons like a lack of finances from the initial development company, the 2008 recession, and most notably, the inability to sell units. Only 350 out of 1,193 residential units were sold, and more than 50% of those were sold to foreign investors who wouldn’t even be residing in the city.

Most recently, Rahm Emanuel has showcased his propensity for big development through his proposal to Amazon to make Chicago the location of their second headquarters, which would have allegedly brought 50,000 jobs into the city. The city constructed a generous offer with over $2 billion in tax breaks, an undisclosed amount of TIF dollars, and over 10 sites throughout the metropolitan area to court the corporate giant. Chicago wasn’t selected, but still fell victim to Amazon’s plan to pit cities against each other, eventually accepting the offer of the highest bidder. Once the tax breaks certain cities were able to offer outnumbered the entire GDP’s of others, Amazon announced their 20 finalists: inciting another round of municipalities offering everything they could short of elected positions.

Despite their initial proposition to move 50,000 jobs to one city, Amazon ended up splitting the campuses between Long Island, NY and Crystal City, VA, giving no city the promised 50k of jobs and billions of annual revenue. This left Chicago (and 17 other cities) with multiple massive development sites and future allocated budgets for TIF dollars and tax breaks. Being a leading tech city, Austin was also one of the unselected finalists. Seeing that an existing bid was already made with tax breaks and development plots already allotted, Apple announced plans to build a $1 billion headquarters shortly after Amazon publically passed on the city.

Like the local administrations of the other 17 cities who saw no corporate interest, Rahm was disappointed. However, having already announced the end of his mayoral administration, he wants to develop anyway. The result is the mixed-use residential/retail closed communities that we see proposed for Lincoln Yards and the 78 today.

Being in his lame duck period, Emanuel has a clock ticking to break ground before he’s out of office. He doesn’t have to worry about the future of the city for the intended low-income recipients of TIF grants (not that he ever has), meaning that the approval from anyone who might oppose is null to him. He’s trying to get this done as fast as possible for a couple of reasons. First, simple vanity. Rahm wants to be the one who brought 2 new profitable community areas to the city and continue Chicago’s acceptance of corporate money to ward off the decay of its postindustrial contemporaries like Detroit, St. Louis, and Cleveland. Secondly, and I can only make an educated guess based on the past campaign contributions to him and his predecessors, but he wants to fulfill a promise made to a developer who “donated” to his campaign.

If Rahm were the mayor of a city outside of the midwest, he may not be pushing for these developments as hard as he is currently, because of where he falls into Chicago’s storied past as a postindustrial midwest city. Thanks to the industrial revolution and world wars, the whole midwest experienced a huge industry boom in the 1920s, 1930s and 1940s. European immigrants were flocking to the midwest, and Chicago in particular, because of the possibility for economic mobility. As white Europeans began to make lives for themselves as Americans and ascend into the middle class, they passed the consumer milestones to cement their status. Such milestones included the house with the white picket fence, the small business, and the automobile. More and more self-made Americans began to experience the luxury of mobility at will, and developers took notice. Chicago’s expanse wasn’t limited by geographic barriers like east coast cities, so suburban municipalities that cost less and had bigger properties could expand in the endless prairie land. Highways were built in the 1950s to aid the “white flight” of the new middle class, who moved to the suburbs and commuted into the city for work.

When white Americans in self-sustaining communities outside of the city borders became too affluent and educated to work in factories, the industrial jobs were taken over by black people moving from the south after the civil rights movement. However, such opportunity for growth in the black community was limited. The 1970s saw industrial jobs starting to move overseas, and black people trying to build communities for themselves in the city were left without income. The result was severe urban decay like other midwest metropolitan hubs: Cleveland, St. Louis, and Detroit, which all experienced “white flight” firsthand. However, the fundamental difference between Chicago proper and the aforementioned cities is that Chicago never experienced decay anything like the overgrown wastelands that occupy Detroit, because of the mayors (particularly Richard J. Daley, who served from 1955–1976) willingness to accept corporate money for development.

In 2019, Chicago is the most capitally prosperous example of the postindustrial midwest city. As great as this may sound, our income is not sustainable. Today we have the reverse of white flight: The Parisification of Chicago. Poor people are moving out to the suburbs and having to commute in due to the cities acceptance of corporate development dollars instead of investing in the building of grassroots communities. Chicago proper is on its way to becoming a shell of the cultural hub it once was, opting for ghost town developments owned by foreign investors, with actual Chicagoans being forced out to the suburbs due to increasing rent and property taxes.

Chicago is always fighting to get developments to avoid becoming the archetypal postindustrial midwest city. Rahm has shown the same insecurities as every mayor in the past through his approval of the 94 story vista tower. He’s shown it through his interest in Elon Musk’s hyperloop. Now, he’s showing it through his backing of Lincoln Yards and The 78. These sentiments directly echo those of Richard M. Daley’s approval the spire. which would make Chicago home of the tallest building in the world like the gloried days of the Sears tower. What Rahm knows, but doesn’t care about in bringing more condos to the city, is that interest in both developments will also echo that of the spire. The units won’t even move and the stores will sit vacant, but that won’t matter to him once he’s out of office.

Everyone agrees that Lincoln Yards and The 78 are huge developments in the legacy of a city. However, Rahm sees a different Chicago than actual Chicagoans. The opulent, skyscraper-lined, and homogenized skyline is not reflective of what the city needs. Sustainable development happens internally, with incentive-based help from the city government. However, Chicago is not following a sustainable model. Rahm and the development companies are saying they want an authentic neighborhood with parks and art centers, but all they really want are corporate money and high rise developments, just like their predecessors.