8 ms·

Raising of Chicago

82 points by lukasgelbmann 2y ago

nkrisc 2y ago
I don't know if this was during the same time period or not, but in some parts of the city (mostly residential or smaller commercial areas) they didn't bother raising the buildings, they just built the streets up higher and added flying walkways from the new sidewalk height to the new front entrances on the second story of the houses. Many of them had stairs that went down to the old ground level and I think in most of them they had been converted to separate apartments. My dad's small commercial building in Pilsen looked normal, but if you peeked into the holes in the sidewalk out front you could see a vaulted space underneath where the old sidewalk used to be, which was kind of unnerving when you realized the sidewalk was crumbling. You could even access it from the basement of his building (which I suppose used to be the ground level?), but he never let me go down there as a kid. I also know of one or two old homes from around this time period in the neighborhood I grew up in (which wasn't part of Chicago at this time) that were later moved off what became the main avenue through the area to new locations about a block away. I think that happened much later though.
- joezydeco 2y ago
  My family is originally from the Pilsen neighborhood, you can see examples all over the place of houses lower than the street. Example: https://maps.app.goo.gl/F39JxUPZoobGMgiq9 https://maps.app.goo.gl/F39JxUPZoobGMgiq9
  - nkrisc 2y ago
    I know between Division and North there’s some remaining blocks like that too: https://maps.app.goo.gl/NHriGdh1cvL193487 https://maps.app.goo.gl/NHriGdh1cvL193487 Though so many are gone now and replaced with new construction.
    - selectodude 2y ago
      It’s a lot broader than that. Goes at least to Fullerton.
    - phil21 2y ago
      New construction will generally follow the old footprint as well. My house was built in 1994 and the lower level is roughly 4ft or so below street/sidewalk/alley grade. We call ours the basement, but in a 3 flat building in the same footprint it would typically be called a garden apartment as it opens to the same level as my backyard and front 'patio' area. My garage is built to street grade, so my backyard is sunken about 4ft from the street to the alley. This holds true for all my neighbors on the block, thus water retention isn't quite as horrific as it might sound during heavy rains. Lots of sump pumps on the block that are 100% required during storms, but strangely mine had none installed and it's been fine. Utilities (sewer) run about 1 foot or so under my foundation to the street, where they are about 5-6ft deep under the street if they need to do work. New construction (tear downs) will typically build below street grade as well since you get an extra floor (4 stories vs. 3) for your new home while remaining under the zoning height restrictions for the neighborhood.
    - joezydeco 2y ago
      I had a relative that lived in this house in Ukranian Village. It's kind of cute how it resisted any change for 100+ years. https://maps.app.goo.gl/jUL4G1DJXfqEggoz8 https://maps.app.goo.gl/jUL4G1DJXfqEggoz8
      - nkrisc 2y ago
        I love houses like that. There are (or were, when I was in high school), quite a few like that in Logan Square and a shrinking number in Lakeview as well that I remember fondly from decades ago. There were even a few like that on an Irving near Damen that I think finally went away, sandwiched between the standard brick and limestone condos. There’s lots of houses like that all over city but those in the gentrifying neighborhoods that I spent a lot of time in stand out to me.
bilbo0s 2y ago
I feel like only in places like Chicago could this have worked. It's like the water system in Chicago, just massive. And everyone just shrugs and says, "Dig 100 miles of deep tunnel and massive reservoirs? Yep. Let's get 'er done." A lot of places I've lived, things like that wouldn't fly. I was equally amazed at Phoenix with their, what I can only call a "strategic water reserve". A lot of thought and money goes into stuff like that. I get the strong sense that in most American cities if you would have told the population that we all need to undertake a massive public work, (Oh, and pay for it by the way), they would yank you from office and tell you to go F yourself.
- dugmartin 2y ago
  It was done in other cities. Boston flooded a bunch of towns 60 miles to the west to build a water supply: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quabbin_Reservoir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quabbin_Reservoir New York City built three long aqueducts to bring in water: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_water_supply_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_water_supply_sys... I doubt you could get anything even resembling those projects built today due to environmental concerns.
  - selectodude 2y ago
    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Water_Tunnel_No._3 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Water_Tunnel_N... Likely not as greenfield development but they’re still building.
  - potato3732842 2y ago
    That's kind of different because they were kicking out a relatively small number of people with not much wealth or power to resist as opposed to doing those sorts of projects in urban areas. You can visit the reservoir area and see the razed town centers that are miles from the actual water. It's kind of a sad monument to the "messy" consequences of central planning.
- fsckboy 2y ago
  >I feel like only in places like Chicago could this have worked the original downtown of Seattle got moved up 1 floor: they didn't raise the buildings, they raised the street, the old 2nd floors became first floors.* You can still visit the underground Seattle in some places. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Underground https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Underground * carefully worded to also work on European floor number systems.
mxuribe 2y ago
The whole concept is bonkers! By this i mean that i can not imagine many officials would even have the will to even try something so big and audacious nowadays. Also, my favorite note in the wikipedia entry (besides the whole article being awesome!), is this one: "Many of the city's old wooden buildings were considered not worth raising, so instead the owners of these wooden buildings had them either demolished or else placed on rollers and moved to the outskirts of Chicago. Business activities in such buildings continued, as they were being moved." Just crazy!
- Kon-Peki 2y ago
  > I can not imagine many officials would even have the will to even try something so big and audacious nowadays. How about renaming 567 streets on a single Friday? https://chicagology.com/chicagostreets/streetnamechanges/ https://chicagology.com/chicagostreets/streetnamechanges/
  - mxuribe 2y ago
    Wow! Even the renaming of streets - which yes, would need physical work to swap out the physical street signs - seems to far fetched to be done nowadays! But, that's a pretty cool factoid; thanks for sharing!
- dredmorbius 2y ago
  In 1930, the e Indiana Bell Telephone Company rotated an 11,000 ton functioning telephone exchange it had acquired merging with Central Union Telephone Company, whilst work continued inside, and with water, sewerage, gas, and electricity service continuing uninterrupted, 90 degrees. The work was performed by the architectural firm of Vonnegut, Bohn & Mueller, co-founded by Bernard Vonnegut, father of the noted author Kurt. <https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-how-did-they-move-an-11000-ton-telephone-exchange-without-suspending-its-operations https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-how...>
  - mxuribe 2y ago
    That's mindbogglingly insane!
dr_dshiv 2y ago
This will totally (have to) happen in Amsterdam within the century.
an_aparallel 2y ago
Ah man - this is one of the cooler things i've ever heard of. I first heard of it in PBS doco "Chicago: City of the Century". That documentary - is one of the finest chronicles of modern society i've ever seen. The insights into psychology, civil engineering, and history are second to none. Most profound to me were the "design" of suburbs with the trappings we dont think very much of these days - libraries, pools, shopping centres and so on - were created to push "ideal lives" which were basically the dangled carrots of real estate empires. Brilliant stuff.
- ashryan 2y ago
  I just came across American Experience for the first time over the last week. What I've seen so far is incredible. This is their YouTube profile: https://www.youtube.com/@AmericanExperiencePBS/featured https://www.youtube.com/@AmericanExperiencePBS/featured Unfortunately, the doc you mention isn't on there. They do have the transcript on their site tho: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/chicago/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/chicago/
  - an_aparallel 2y ago
    Indeed, Ken Burns docos are brilliant!
  - NaOH 2y ago
    Those three American Experience episodes on Chicago can be found here (#s 157–159): https://archive.org/details/american-experience_20220511 https://archive.org/details/american-experience_20220511
    - an_aparallel 2y ago
      Thanks so much for linking this - wouldnt have thought to look for them at IA! Silly of me tbh :)
yegle 2y ago
Apparently Sna Francisco also has the tradition of moving houses, most recently in 2021 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/22/victorian-house-rolls-through-san-francisco-new-address https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/22/victorian-ho... The Guardian also has an article written back then: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/23/san-francisco-victorian-house-moved https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/23/san-francisc...
awad 2y ago
Are all the raised areas sitting on top of the jackscrews (where used) from 170 years ago? That itself is astounding.
- jordanb 2y ago
  No the Jackscrews would have been removed for reuse after the lift. By the way you can still buy jacks like these. They're considered safer than hydraulic jacks and are often called "house jacks": https://www.homedepot.com/p/Jet-20-Ton-Screw-Jack-441320/306183250 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Jet-20-Ton-Screw-Jack-441320/306...
- nkrisc 2y ago
  No, as the article states they raised the buildings then built a new foundation underneath.
animal_spirits 2y ago
I like that in the drawing of the men lifting the hotel, there's people in the hotel. I would be so pissed at them lol
Oarch 2y ago
I've told people about this event before and they couldn't believe it! Then I tried to research it more, find more depictions and there's frustratingly little online. Began to make me wonder whether it was a prank.
alehlopeh 2y ago
Miami Beach has been doing this for a couple of decades now. In a few places the street is 1 or 2 feet higher than the buildings. https://maps.app.goo.gl/eRJZvDHCgWQ73KZLA https://maps.app.goo.gl/eRJZvDHCgWQ73KZLA
opwieurposiu 2y ago
A fair number of cities have done this, Galveston, Sacramento, Seattle.
evbogue 2y ago
This past summer I worked a job off lower lower Wacker Drive, which is a trip to navigate but once you get the hang of the area the whole region is fascinating. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacker_Drive https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacker_Drive
- dredmorbius 2y ago
  (In)famously: <https://yewtu.be/watch?v=NB5bMyir4-g https://yewtu.be/watch?v=NB5bMyir4-g> (The Blues Brothers, 1980)

82 points by lukasgelbmann 2y ago

I don't know if this was during the same time period or not, but in some parts of the city (mostly residential or smaller commercial areas) they didn't bother raising the buildings, they just built the streets up higher and added flying walkways from the new sidewalk height to the new front entrances on the second story of the houses. Many of them had stairs that went down to the old ground level and I think in most of them they had been converted to separate apartments. My dad's small commercial building in Pilsen looked normal, but if you peeked into the holes in the sidewalk out front you could see a vaulted space underneath where the old sidewalk used to be, which was kind of unnerving when you realized the sidewalk was crumbling. You could even access it from the basement of his building (which I suppose used to be the ground level?), but he never let me go down there as a kid. I also know of one or two old homes from around this time period in the neighborhood I grew up in (which wasn't part of Chicago at this time) that were later moved off what became the main avenue through the area to new locations about a block away. I think that happened much later though.

joezydeco 2y ago
My family is originally from the Pilsen neighborhood, you can see examples all over the place of houses lower than the street. Example: https://maps.app.goo.gl/F39JxUPZoobGMgiq9 https://maps.app.goo.gl/F39JxUPZoobGMgiq9
- nkrisc 2y ago
  I know between Division and North there’s some remaining blocks like that too: https://maps.app.goo.gl/NHriGdh1cvL193487 https://maps.app.goo.gl/NHriGdh1cvL193487 Though so many are gone now and replaced with new construction.
  - selectodude 2y ago
    It’s a lot broader than that. Goes at least to Fullerton.
  - phil21 2y ago
    New construction will generally follow the old footprint as well. My house was built in 1994 and the lower level is roughly 4ft or so below street/sidewalk/alley grade. We call ours the basement, but in a 3 flat building in the same footprint it would typically be called a garden apartment as it opens to the same level as my backyard and front 'patio' area. My garage is built to street grade, so my backyard is sunken about 4ft from the street to the alley. This holds true for all my neighbors on the block, thus water retention isn't quite as horrific as it might sound during heavy rains. Lots of sump pumps on the block that are 100% required during storms, but strangely mine had none installed and it's been fine. Utilities (sewer) run about 1 foot or so under my foundation to the street, where they are about 5-6ft deep under the street if they need to do work. New construction (tear downs) will typically build below street grade as well since you get an extra floor (4 stories vs. 3) for your new home while remaining under the zoning height restrictions for the neighborhood.
  - joezydeco 2y ago
    I had a relative that lived in this house in Ukranian Village. It's kind of cute how it resisted any change for 100+ years. https://maps.app.goo.gl/jUL4G1DJXfqEggoz8 https://maps.app.goo.gl/jUL4G1DJXfqEggoz8
    - nkrisc 2y ago
      I love houses like that. There are (or were, when I was in high school), quite a few like that in Logan Square and a shrinking number in Lakeview as well that I remember fondly from decades ago. There were even a few like that on an Irving near Damen that I think finally went away, sandwiched between the standard brick and limestone condos. There’s lots of houses like that all over city but those in the gentrifying neighborhoods that I spent a lot of time in stand out to me.

bilbo0s 2y ago

I feel like only in places like Chicago could this have worked. It's like the water system in Chicago, just massive. And everyone just shrugs and says, "Dig 100 miles of deep tunnel and massive reservoirs? Yep. Let's get 'er done." A lot of places I've lived, things like that wouldn't fly. I was equally amazed at Phoenix with their, what I can only call a "strategic water reserve". A lot of thought and money goes into stuff like that. I get the strong sense that in most American cities if you would have told the population that we all need to undertake a massive public work, (Oh, and pay for it by the way), they would yank you from office and tell you to go F yourself.

dugmartin 2y ago
It was done in other cities. Boston flooded a bunch of towns 60 miles to the west to build a water supply: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quabbin_Reservoir https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quabbin_Reservoir New York City built three long aqueducts to bring in water: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_water_supply_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_water_supply_sys... I doubt you could get anything even resembling those projects built today due to environmental concerns.
- selectodude 2y ago
  https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Water_Tunnel_No._3 https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_Water_Tunnel_N... Likely not as greenfield development but they’re still building.
- potato3732842 2y ago
  That's kind of different because they were kicking out a relatively small number of people with not much wealth or power to resist as opposed to doing those sorts of projects in urban areas. You can visit the reservoir area and see the razed town centers that are miles from the actual water. It's kind of a sad monument to the "messy" consequences of central planning.
fsckboy 2y ago
>I feel like only in places like Chicago could this have worked the original downtown of Seattle got moved up 1 floor: they didn't raise the buildings, they raised the street, the old 2nd floors became first floors.* You can still visit the underground Seattle in some places. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Underground https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seattle_Underground * carefully worded to also work on European floor number systems.

mxuribe 2y ago

The whole concept is bonkers! By this i mean that i can not imagine many officials would even have the will to even try something so big and audacious nowadays. Also, my favorite note in the wikipedia entry (besides the whole article being awesome!), is this one: "Many of the city's old wooden buildings were considered not worth raising, so instead the owners of these wooden buildings had them either demolished or else placed on rollers and moved to the outskirts of Chicago. Business activities in such buildings continued, as they were being moved." Just crazy!

Kon-Peki 2y ago
> I can not imagine many officials would even have the will to even try something so big and audacious nowadays. How about renaming 567 streets on a single Friday? https://chicagology.com/chicagostreets/streetnamechanges/ https://chicagology.com/chicagostreets/streetnamechanges/
- mxuribe 2y ago
  Wow! Even the renaming of streets - which yes, would need physical work to swap out the physical street signs - seems to far fetched to be done nowadays! But, that's a pretty cool factoid; thanks for sharing!
dredmorbius 2y ago
In 1930, the e Indiana Bell Telephone Company rotated an 11,000 ton functioning telephone exchange it had acquired merging with Central Union Telephone Company, whilst work continued inside, and with water, sewerage, gas, and electricity service continuing uninterrupted, 90 degrees. The work was performed by the architectural firm of Vonnegut, Bohn & Mueller, co-founded by Bernard Vonnegut, father of the noted author Kurt. <https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-how-did-they-move-an-11000-ton-telephone-exchange-without-suspending-its-operations https://www.archdaily.com/973183/the-building-that-moved-how...>
- mxuribe 2y ago
  That's mindbogglingly insane!

dr_dshiv 2y ago

This will totally (have to) happen in Amsterdam within the century.

an_aparallel 2y ago

Ah man - this is one of the cooler things i've ever heard of. I first heard of it in PBS doco "Chicago: City of the Century". That documentary - is one of the finest chronicles of modern society i've ever seen. The insights into psychology, civil engineering, and history are second to none. Most profound to me were the "design" of suburbs with the trappings we dont think very much of these days - libraries, pools, shopping centres and so on - were created to push "ideal lives" which were basically the dangled carrots of real estate empires. Brilliant stuff.

ashryan 2y ago
I just came across American Experience for the first time over the last week. What I've seen so far is incredible. This is their YouTube profile: https://www.youtube.com/@AmericanExperiencePBS/featured https://www.youtube.com/@AmericanExperiencePBS/featured Unfortunately, the doc you mention isn't on there. They do have the transcript on their site tho: https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/chicago/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/films/chicago/
- an_aparallel 2y ago
  Indeed, Ken Burns docos are brilliant!
- NaOH 2y ago
  Those three American Experience episodes on Chicago can be found here (#s 157–159): https://archive.org/details/american-experience_20220511 https://archive.org/details/american-experience_20220511
  - an_aparallel 2y ago
    Thanks so much for linking this - wouldnt have thought to look for them at IA! Silly of me tbh :)

yegle 2y ago

Apparently Sna Francisco also has the tradition of moving houses, most recently in 2021 https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/22/victorian-house-rolls-through-san-francisco-new-address https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/22/victorian-ho... The Guardian also has an article written back then: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/23/san-francisco-victorian-house-moved https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/feb/23/san-francisc...

awad 2y ago

Are all the raised areas sitting on top of the jackscrews (where used) from 170 years ago? That itself is astounding.

jordanb 2y ago
No the Jackscrews would have been removed for reuse after the lift. By the way you can still buy jacks like these. They're considered safer than hydraulic jacks and are often called "house jacks": https://www.homedepot.com/p/Jet-20-Ton-Screw-Jack-441320/306183250 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Jet-20-Ton-Screw-Jack-441320/306...
nkrisc 2y ago
No, as the article states they raised the buildings then built a new foundation underneath.

animal_spirits 2y ago

I like that in the drawing of the men lifting the hotel, there's people in the hotel. I would be so pissed at them lol

Oarch 2y ago

I've told people about this event before and they couldn't believe it! Then I tried to research it more, find more depictions and there's frustratingly little online. Began to make me wonder whether it was a prank.

alehlopeh 2y ago

Miami Beach has been doing this for a couple of decades now. In a few places the street is 1 or 2 feet higher than the buildings. https://maps.app.goo.gl/eRJZvDHCgWQ73KZLA https://maps.app.goo.gl/eRJZvDHCgWQ73KZLA

opwieurposiu 2y ago

A fair number of cities have done this, Galveston, Sacramento, Seattle.

evbogue 2y ago

This past summer I worked a job off lower lower Wacker Drive, which is a trip to navigate but once you get the hang of the area the whole region is fascinating. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacker_Drive https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wacker_Drive

dredmorbius 2y ago
(In)famously: <https://yewtu.be/watch?v=NB5bMyir4-g https://yewtu.be/watch?v=NB5bMyir4-g> (The Blues Brothers, 1980)