Downtown office towers sit half-empty, Wabash storefronts keep shuttering, and weekend foot traffic doesn't make up for the Monday-through-Friday desert. Is the city doing enough to reimagine the Loop, or has leadership already given up?
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Add your commentHot take that I'll stand behind: the Loop was always kind of soulless even BEFORE the pandemic. It was a place you went to work or catch the Metra, not a place you actually wanted to be. The problem isn't remote work killing a vibrant neighborhood — it's remote work exposing that the neighborhood was really just a commuter machine dressed up as a city center.
Question for the people defending the city's response: have any of you actually tried to open a small business downtown? I tried in 2022. The permitting process alone took eight months. By the time I got approval my startup capital had burned down to nothing. The problem isn't just remote work or even vacant storefronts — it's that the city makes it structurally impossible to fill those storefronts with anything interesting. Fix THAT and watch what happens.
Born and raised in Bridgeport, worked in the Loop for 22 years before retiring. What's happening to Wabash right now would've been unthinkable in 2005. I remember when that strip between Madison and Monroe had zero vacant storefronts. Zero. Now I walk it and feel like I'm in a ghost town with a Divvy station. Nobody in city hall has a real plan. They have PowerPoints. There's a difference.
My sister owns a sandwich shop on Michigan Ave and she's down like 60% from 2019 numbers on weekdays. Sixty percent. She has three kids. So to answer the question of whether anyone cares enough to fix it — her landlord sure doesn't, the alderman sends newsletters, and the mayor gave a speech. Super helpful stuff all around.
Okay whoever said the Loop has MORE foot traffic than 1995 needs to back that up immediately because that is genuinely one of the most confidently incorrect things I've read on this site. City's own data shows weekday pedestrian counts in the central business district are still down roughly 30% from pre-pandemic levels. Where are you getting 1995 numbers from, your gut?
Moved here from Austin two years ago for a job that turned out to be fully remote anyway. So I literally never go downtown. Not once has the city given me a reason to. No shade, but compare the Loop to what Denver has done with their downtown conversion projects and it's embarrassing. Chicago is sitting on prime real estate acting like the 1990s are coming back.
Actually the city DID announce a whole residential conversion program for vacant office buildings — something like $150 million set aside to help developers convert towers to apartments. People act like nothing is being done. Is it fast enough? No. Is it perfect? No. But the idea that leadership has completely given up is just not accurate and I wish people would do five minutes of reading before posting.
idk man i just want the Berghoff to stay open and for the train not to smell like that and if those two things happen i'll consider it a win honestly
the loop isnt dead it just smells like it lol. walked through on a tuesday at noon last month and genuinely thought i had the date wrong. like was it a holiday? nope just chicago in 2024
Fun fact: the Loop has more daily foot traffic than it did in 1995. Look it up. Remote work shifted the PEAK, sure, but the idea of a total death spiral is media narrative more than reality. The Riverwalk alone pulls serious numbers year-round now. I'm not saying there aren't real problems, I'm saying the doom-posting gets old.
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