CTA Tattler

I can't wait for the CTA to start doing random bag checks. Oh wait, yes I can.

wow, sure is amazing how slow the comments come rolling in when there's nothing to complain about... :)

Hmm, I'd rather complain about the things that are happening right now and/or not getting done, rather than the ones that are 8 years and a snowballs chance in HE double hockeysticks from actually happening.

Besides, if things keep going like they are, the crappy state of the CTA will be one of the major things that keeps us from getting the games. Besides, I think I'd like to go to Rio instead.

On the off chance that we do get it, I'll take that time off of work, leave town and rent out my condo for the duration at a very outrageous fee...

KevinB

sounds like a plan to me!

I'd like to go to a few events, sure it would be an annoying month. Though, it would put Chicago on the international stage for a couple weeks, I don't see how that could hurt. I really don't understand why everyone thinks it would suck so bad to have the Olympics. Though the scores Chicago got in the first round don't bode well for it's chances.

If Chicago isn't on the international stage right now, it doesn't deserve to get the Olympics.

Mind you, I think the Olympics will be the coffin nail in this city -- typically cities amass such heavy debt during the preparations for the Olympics that it can take forever to pay it off. And the suspensions of basic rights is alarming:

"[...] Atlanta gained notoriety among Olympic watchers when it declared the central business district a "sanitized corridor" and had police pre-print arrest citations, with the words "African-American," "Male," and "Homeless" already filled in. [...]"

Economically,

"Lake Forest College sports economist Robert Baade mulched a mountain of data after the Atlanta Olympics, revealing that the city and state could actually have lost jobs in the long-term, because Olympic mania captured public and private dollars that could have had more sustained economic impact. (Forty percent of Games-related jobs vanished after the two-week party left town.)

"[...] And University of South Florida economist Philip Porter discovered that in Atlanta the kind of tourist income games backers always promise didn't materialize. Hotel vacancies, retail sales, and airport use all stayed essentially the same despite the Olympics."

And

"[...] Recent host cities have woken up after the games with wretched hangovers. Athens is swimming in $9 billion of debt, Sydney took on $3.2 billion, and the vaunted Barcelona Games stuck taxpayers with a $1.4 billion tab. The 2012 London Games has already spent twice its budget, and estimates for Beijing's bonanza come in around $40 billion."

http://www.alternet.org/story/56128/ (see also http://www.cohre.org/store/attachments/Atlanta_background_paper.pdf )

We already have the highest sales tax in the country. Can't wait until they have to raise it again because the revenues they projected didn't materialize. (Not that they'll wait that long.)

Commenters will complain about anything I guess (I know, look who's talking, right?). I think the Olympics would be a great economic boon to the city, if they're done the right way.

Ramming Olympic venues into economically challenged neighborhoods without helping transform those neighborhoods for the better isn't the best idea (i.e. taking away ballfields for a stadium in Washington Park is not a big boon to Englewood--or Hyde Park, for that matter).

As far as those "subway searches", feh. After 9/11, NYC got rifle-toting National Guardsmen in Grand Central Terminal. Chicago got muzzled alleged-police dogs led around by Securitas rent-a-cops. I doubt that's going to be much of an issue.

After all, those subway searches in NYC are pretty pointless. Anyone wanting to engage in mischief need just find a station without a security table, and as it is they only search very few riders. A month in NYC last August riding the system 5 and 6 times a day (looking for an apartment during my happily failed attempt to move back) and my bag wasn't searched once. Not once.

Although searches might do us some good here in Chicago. Maybe the cops could confiscate all bags of pumpkin seeds, boxes of Harold's chicken, and open cans of Coke. I'm sure the floor of every L train would be grateful.

Mike: Perhaps you can tell us the "right" way to do the Olympics, a way that avoids the massive debt other cities---some less corrupt than ours--have taken on, and which their taxpayers are helping to pay off.

I ask this respectfully and honestly, without snark. Tone can be hard to detect in blogs.

I also think the Olympics will make things worse in Chicago because the Games will provide an economic boost to the Machine, giving it extended life. Don't think that is what a lot of Chicago insiders aren't counting on. And what is good for the Machine is often what is NOT good for Chicago, at least the honest and decent people who live here.

I don't know what the right way is, Miller, but it would be more useful to explore all of our options rather than just say off the bat that the Olympics will be a bad thing.

The implications of what you say above about the machine are that any economic stimulus is a benefit to the machine and thus to be avoided. Where do you draw the line?

For that matter, how do you define "honest and decent" vs. those associated with the machine? Everyone has good and bad, if you want to define it that way, inside of them. And for all the money on the side that the machine has generated in the past century, I don't think anyone can argue the Daley machine has the city's best interests at heart.

Eventually I figure they'll all be dead or in jail on federal corruption charges anyway (unless Cook County continues to desire the misgovernment of Stroger fils, that is). But I don't want to stifle the economic health of Chicago either, just to "punish" local government.

As with all things, there is a middle way, and it is our responsibility to find it. You asked how I would change things. I would bring the community into it from the beginning. What does the city as a whole want, and most importantly what do the neighborhoods nearest the venues want and need to become better neighborhoods. And then pressure the machine to do those things so that Chicago can transfrom through the Olympics, for the better.

Mike, you say: " I would bring the community into it from the beginning. "

But see, that's kind of the point. That did not happen. And we can't go back and change it. The Olympics, whether you want them or not, are being rammed down the throats of citizens, and years ago Daley even said he didn't want the games. That should tell you whose interests are being protected here. Hint: It ain't ours.

And now: Vague details about financing. Plans that call for certain sites to be transfered without public debate. Same old, same old.

I see your point about drawing the line. But I also realize that thanks in large part to Machine corruption and bad management, we are paying more and more for less and less on transit and other services. So, anything backed so heavily by the Machine is suspect to me.

Agreed. So let's bring the community in now. The locational decisions are set. But the city can still listen to communities about what they want and need and then work to make those changes happen. There are a lot of annoyed social advocates and, more importantly, activists in Chicago right now who want to use the Olympics as a leveraging tool to get neighborhood needs met. I'd prefer not to see pickets and actions that would make Chicago look foolish on the world stage (but they're already happening).

I hear you about the financing. Smoke and mirrors and slight desperation. But the Olympic Committee has already called that into question, so there won't be an easy out for the machine there. We're not talking about the harbor deal here ;-)