challengerpark
I'm trying something new this year, possible for the first time because of Google Maps recently adding RSS feeds to every customized map made there; I call it a "placeblog," consisting of photos and write-ups of various random locations around Chicago I visit on my bicycle this summer and fall, only instead of presented by date they're all plotted on a city map, so that you search and browse by location instead of age. I'm originally uploading the photos here at Flickr, so that people can check them out in a normal fashion if they want; and then you can <a href="http://tinyurl.com/2009bikeblog" rel="nofollow">click here</a> for the actual placeblog/map, or <a href="http://www.google.com/maps/ms?hl=en&ie=UTF8&msa=0&output=georss&msid=112356573111939317036.000469d4bd545c821ff53" rel="nofollow">click here</a> for the RSS feed, or simply stop by the main headquarters for all my Chicago bicycle maps at [http://www.jasonpettus.com/maps/].
Here: For nearly a century there used to be a big problem in the Uptown neighborhood, where the CTA red-line elevated-train (or "el") tracks ran parallel and close to the eastern wall of the famed Graceland Cemetary; the resulting gap was too wide to be a mere alley, too noisy for residential construction, so instead was a trash-filled wasteland literally from from the 1890s to 1990s. Then the city finally turned it into what you see here -- Challenger Park (yes, named after the space shuttle that exploded), one of many ultra-specific kinds of parks the city maintains, which in this case contains a nicely landscaped soft-track half-mile running course, plus a fenced-in dog park at its center, and frankly not much else. It's a great addition to this neighborhood, a nice little exercise-oriented green space in what used to be a dirty, graffiti-filled apocalyptic space; I'm all for the city sneaking in more and more science-fictiony-looking "post-Industrial green spaces" around the city like this.
