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Montrose Beach Plan Would Reduce Parking, Add Bike Track For Racers

By Adeshina Emmanuel | July 24, 2014 9:26am | Updated on July 25, 2014 8:44am
 Architect Matt Nardella has ideas about changing Montrose Beach that include reducing parking.
Montrose Beach Vision
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UPTOWN — An architect's vision for Montrose Beach would reduce parking, bolster green space and install a track where cyclists could race without dodging walkers and joggers along lakefront paths.

Matt Nardella, of Moss Architecture, wants the popular lakefront destination to function "as a habitat for everything, not just people and cars but also animals and birds, and it should be hospitable to all species," he said.

He wants to use "some of the (many) looping paved driving areas near the beach for the creation of a cyclocross track that would create space for cyclists to "speed to their hearts desire without conflicting with walkers strolling elsewhere," as Moss said in a blog post about the sketches.

He posted sketches online last week revealing his proposal for a Montrose Beach makeover.

Nardella envisions more open space for people and the migratory birds that frequent the bird and butterfly sanctuary there. Two parking lots west of the sand would be eliminated and and free street parking near the beach would be metered. That would mean less space for cars at the beach, which he said has "over nine acres of asphalt parking lot, not counting street parking." His suggestions also include more Divvy bike stations, bike parking and a boardwalk among other features.

"I think when we give too much space over to accommodating cars then we lose the main reason for that public space being there," he said.

Ald. James Cappleman (46th), in the aftermath of an illegal beach party earlier this month that ended in a riot, sparked the discussion about reducing parking when he told the Chicago Tribune that an excess of parking space at the beach makes it easier there than at other beaches for large crowds to convene quickly.

Tressa Feher, Cappleman's chief of staff, said his office had no comment on Nardella's plan and would require a city traffic study, a concrete plan for executing the proposed changes and details about "who's going to pay for it," before forming an opinion. The park district was unreachable for comment.

North Side residents at Montrose Beach on Wednesday had mixed feelings about reducing parking plans.

Ryan White, a Lincoln Square resident who teaches English at Northeastern Illinois University, was idling on his bike on a lakefront path near the beach Wednesday, waiting for his dad to join him so the two could take a ride downtown to Grant Park.

He said the beach area certainly "doesn't need any more cement."

"I think it could take a reduction of parking," he said.

Uptown resident Yesenia Alvarez said it would be a pain to have to lug a grill, baby stroller or elderly relative to the lakefront. She was also worried that people would still drive to the beach, circle around and compete for parking elsewhere in the neighborhood, creating traffic and tension.

"It could just make things even crazier around here," she said, with "people thirsty to find a parking spot."

Terrance Dean, an Albany Park resident, was all for reducing parking if it kept unruly suburbanites from the area of the like who allegedly launched bottles at police officers during the illegal party.

Yet he worried it would work to the same effect for Chicagoans on the Far South and West sides who he said would effectively be cut off from Montrose Beach if driving there became a hassle, making visits convenient only for North Side residents near the lake.

"It's almost segregation at that point," he said, admitting that using "the S-word" might sound a bit hyperbolic but standing by his assessment.

Reducing parking is often a contentious issue at the community level. Nardella said.

"I don't think there's ever going to be a time when people don't complain about parking," he said.

"I'm not sure that future exists," he added, laughing. "I know that whenever you suggest that parking go away that it creates a bit of a commotion."

Julia Leventon, of Rogers Park, thinks "the lake is very attractive, and we're all drawn to it — when we're sitting in our offices and apartments, everybody wants to be here because it's so beautiful," she said.

"And I think people are not going to stop coming with less parking. Maybe they will ride bikes or they will walk, but they'll still come," she said.

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