Michael Reese Park: A better spot for the Lucas Museum in Chicago
posted 6-30-2014 - 6:36 pm

 
Last week, the Chicago Tribune ran an article announcing the site selection for a new museum that director and producer George Lucas is hoping to build. It could have been in San Francisco, but that city blew its chance. That, the fact that we get more than double the annual number of tourists that San Francisco gets, and the fact that Lucas recently married a Chicagoan (Ariel Investments president Mellody Hobson) and lives here part time now gave the nod to us. The museum, which is obviously still in the planning stage, will shortly be renamed the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art; the tentative name had been the Lucas Cultural Arts Museum.

The name change is a minor thing. The thing that does concern me and a lot of other Chicagoans is that Mayor Rahm Emanuel, who vigorously courted the project and supposedly has a Site Selection Task Force, seems willing to let Lucas break a time-honored rule about not building on the lakefront: the proposed museum as presently imagined would tear up the existing parking lots between Soldier Field and McCormick Place. Great idea, bad location; it’s not that those lots shouldn’t be torn up and put underground anyway to create more park space – they should. But the building doesn’t belong there. I hope the Chicago Plan Commission, which has to approve the site, insists on an alternative — and I have one in mind that’s only a few blocks further south.



There is an excellent location that has more than enough land and a train stop nearby: the old Michael Reese Hospital property between 26th Street and 31st Street, from Vernon Avenue east to the Metra tracks. You really have no idea how BIG it is until you've driven through it. And it's convenient: there’s a Metra stop right at 27th Street that goes straight downtown, and a shuttle or trolley could make it from the convention halls of McCormick Place to the Michael Reese site in 5 minutes. There are also Metra stops at the Museum Campus and at McCormick Place. Moreover, the Michael Reese land is already cleared and lying empty, and it has low traffic for now.

Preservationists fought like hell to keep that historic campus from being torn down, but alas, former mayor Richie Daley let it happen anyway on his watch. Whatever plans the city administration had for it at the time remain a mystery (rumor said it might have been one site to be used for our failed Olympics bid) and were never realized anyway, despite many suggestions by interested parties such as Landmarks Illinois and Friends of the Parks, which is opposed to the lakefront site and very likely to sue. This would be a fantastic way to put that several-blocks-long derelict lot to good use.

There's been talk that perhaps the city is suggesting this huge plot as the site of the future Barack Obama Presidential Library. No problem; there's plenty of room for that, the Lucas Museum, and more. We should admit, however, that the University of Chicago is probably in the lead insofar as Chicago sites for the Obama library are concerned, and U of C is a lot more likely to offer a site that is close to campus than anywhere near McCormick Place (and the Michael Reese plot really isn't that close to the university; so much for that). So, the Michael Reese site is quite likely safe for the Lucas Museum.

But wait, there’s more: wasn’t there a big scandal some years ago about plans to move the Chicago Children’s Museum from Navy Pier to Grant Park? Of course there was. Loud adverse public opinion killed that suggestion, and quite appropriately, too, despite support from City Hall back then (Richie again). There are strict rules and legal precedents banning such construction in our front yard, meaning Grant Park, of which world-famous Millennium Park is only one section. There are a few legal barriers for Burnham Park as well, which was itself originally a compromise to avoid the legal problems involving Grant Park; but the Michael Reese lot has no such problems at all.

Meanwhile, the Children’s Museum still needs more room. Why not move it and the Lucas Museum to the Michael Reese site? There would be more than enough room for both plus the presidential library, with one museum at the north end and one at the south, along with landscaped park land, a playground, picnic areas, an outdoor food court or parking area for food trucks, perhaps even an ice-skating rink/skateboard area, plus an underground garage beneath the park (a city-owned and operated lot, please!) — all in between the two museum buildings. Plus, there are other reasons to put the Lucas Museum at the Michael Reese site: 1) it looks to be a vanity museum, so far; other than the Norman Rockwell paintings, we don't know what else will go into it, so it shouldn't automatically be accorded the same status by association as the Field Museum, the planetarium or the aquarium. And 2) putting it on the same campus as the Children's Museum is at least thematically more in agreement.



It’s a perfect solution: it’s close to Lake Shore Drive and rapid train transit, it wouldn’t block or occupy the lakefront, it's still very close to McCormick Place to get the convention visitors but wouldn't dislocate the tailgaters at Bears games, it would put to use a space that’s an eyesore and not collecting taxes now, and it would bring more cultural amenities to the nearby Douglas neighborhood and greater Bronzeville. This would not only be an ideal solution for the two museums but would also solve a huge problem for the city and for the neighborhood, as right now that enormous empty space looks like a bombed-out war zone.

Think about it: the Michael Reese site could work, and work well. You could probably even get the community groups and preservationists on your side. For that matter, there could be an architectural competition for the overall site. This plan could create an entirely new Museum Campus South. Just saying, Rahm: you could have a win-win for all, instead of a political hot potato in a town with a long memory.