SWEET HOME SUBURBAN CHICAGO — The Weekly Opine

Vibrant suburban downtowns beckon, if you are listening. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

It’s easier out here

During his long run as host of The Late Show on CBS, David Letterman was asked if he planned to move the show’s production from New York to Los Angeles. Letterman answered, “it’s easier out there,” presumably a nod to L.A.’s pleasant weather and laid-back groove.

Weather in Chicago’s western suburbs does not compare to Southern California. Suburbia does have an advantage over downtown Chicago during springtime, when temps run 10-degrees warmer away from Lake Michigan’s stiff breezes. The real bargain is less congestion, ample free parking and lower taxes.

Unlike Letterman, who never moved his show to the West Coast, I was overcome by the pull of suburbia, and quiet summer evenings relaxing on my patio sipping wine. After 22 years of city living, I could not resist picking up and heading west. Now just 13 miles from downtown, sometimes Chicago feels a hundred miles away.

The blues was fun

My affair with Chicago peaked more than two decades ago, when I moved from lakeside Belmont Harbor to the burgeoning (now hyper-chic) West Loop-Fulton Market district. At that time, I was a good dancer and could still hoop. Fighting workday traffic was comparable to playing an imaginary video game called “Grand Rush-Hour Commute.”

Chicago’s blues music scene flourished in those days, amplified by the annual blues pub crawl. A fixture on my calendar, the pub crawl was a midweek adult ‘field trip.’ What’s not to like about paying a nominal cover charge, boarding a school bus with friends, and being transported from one side of town to the other seeing top blues bands?

The classic B.L.U.E.S. nightclub. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

Pub crawl venues included B.L.U.E.S, Blues, Etc., and Lilly’s on the North Side. Blue Chicago and Buddy Guy’s Legends downtown. Rosa’s in Logan Square, and the famous Checkerboard Lounge on the South Side. Alcohol was allowed on the buses as you traversed from club to club, soaking in the blues on a warm spring night.

Alas, the blues pub crawl is no more, another fading memory. It was a fun experience, like the time my pal Angelo and I attended an afternoon Cubs game at Wrigley, grabbed dinner at a steakhouse, then hustled to the Chicago Stadium in time for tip-off of a Michael Jordan-led Bulls playoff game against Larry Bird and the Celts.

Back then, New York’s venerable Village Voice wrote that Chicago bluesman Frank “Son” Seals was among the best guitarists in the world. And when you heard the late Seals at work, you believed it. He played with a gritty, attacking style. Seals did not just play the guitar he dominated it. A blues thoroughbred, Seals was my favorite performer.

Nowadays, the local blues scene in Chicago is a shell of its former self, the highlight occurring each January when Buddy Guy takes up residency at his namesake club for a full month. (When the local blues club highlight of the year happens during the coldest month of winter, the glory days of Chicago blues evidently have passed).

Chicago’s annual blues fest is still a national powerhouse event taking place in early-June. However, years-long, traffic snarling road construction separates me from seeing it.

Sorry Greta, I love my Torino! (Photo credit The NY Post, The Weekly Opine)

Where would I park?

Don’t tell Greta Thunberg; I own three cars. The inspirational climate change princess, with whom I totally agree relative to dire prospects for Earth’s survival if we don’t act with immediate purpose, would chafe at the sight, sound and smell of me bombing around town in my gas guzzling ‘76 Torino. (Last week, I feared Greta would show up trick-or-treating at my house.)

Truthfully, the best way to clear my mind is to take the Torino out for a spin, tunes cranked up, on a sunny weekend morning!

For the record, I do my clean/green part; my electric and gas bills consistently rank me “great” at conserving energy. I recycle. When mowing the lawn, my landscaper leaves the clippings as a nutrient source for my yard. My plants are pollinator-friendly and attract monarch butterflies. It’s been over five years since my yard was artificially watered.

(To fully digress, there needs to be thoughtfulness as we go green/clean. For example, bats, which protect corn and soybeans by eating crop-destroying bugs, are being killed by the thousands by wind turbines as they migrate south.)

Anyhoo, if I lived in the city, where would I park three cars? At what cost? Which car(s) would be relegated to the street for weeks at a time, abused by winter snow and corroding road salt? Parking in the city is so tight that scoring more than one space is either cost prohibitive or impractical.

Further complicating things, under the tutelage of former Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Chicago adopted an anti-car posture. Once thriving, flowing streets such as Dearborn Street and Washington Boulevard had vehicle lanes pinched to make room for bike and bus lanes.

Waiting in the wings are those menacing, motorized scooters – having already popped up on college campuses across the land. Now being rolled out in cities nationwide, eventually, scooters will take over the entire world.

My nightmare is a gang of angry scooter riders, led by Ms. Thunberg, forcibly escorting me and the Torino to a junkyard.

Why would anyone pay to do this? (Photo credit: The Weekly Opine)

Slow ridin’

The Dwight D. Eisenhower Memorial Expressway. The Eisenhower. The Ike. I-290. Regardless of what you call it, the highway running from the western suburbs east into the city is a pain in the neck, even as it provides a panoramic view of Chicago’s spectacular skyline.

During off-peak hours, say, Saturday morning, it is fun to zip along the Ike. As you make the slight left curve, just past Austin Boulevard, the breathtaking architecture comes into view. From that point eastward, the steel mountains slowly become more imposing, their magnetism pulling you into the city.

A massive construction project underway at the eastern edge has been going on…for years. Already several years behind schedule and millions over budget, the Illinois Department of Transportation has turned driving the Ike into a nearly decade-long torture test.

Renderings of the finished project look impressive. However, if there are any more delays, the expressway will be out of style by the time it’s completed, with laggards left to gaze upward at Google flying cars bypassing the Ike altogether.

Taxes cometh, residents go-eth

Mayor Lori Lightfoot has a huge budget problem. Misled about the severity of Chicago’s financial problems by her predecessor, Rahm Emanuel, Lightfoot transparently says all stones must be turned as she attempts to solve the crisis. (Some financial experts suggest Chicago is on the road to bankruptcy.)

During the mayoral campaign Lightfoot teased the idea of taxing suburbanites who enter the city (they would wave at city residents passing the other direction, moving out of the city). Upon presenting her budget proposal the mayor kicked taxing (area code) 847, 630 and 708ers down the congested road.

That’s good because Chicago, appealing, energizing and (some of it) world-class, does not hold enough sway to warrant anyone paying a tax for the privilege of sitting in traffic and, upon arrival, paying rip-off rates to park.

Arguably, America’s top restaurant town, Chicago’s dining prowess long ago spread to suburbia. Foodies needn’t visit the city to sample top notch vittles, or other fun experiences.

You can still chill in the bookstore at Oakbrook Center. (Photo credit The Weekly Opine)

The Tri-Cities in the Fox River Valley, St. Charles, Geneva and Batavia, seem a world away from Chicago (actually, a 60 to 90-minute drive). Stellar restaurants like Niche, pubs with live music and unique retailers make the 3rd Street/Chicago Avenue district in Geneva a great experience day or night.

Closer in, La Grange, Hinsdale, Western Springs and Elmhurst offer lively, eclectic downtowns with excellent dining, music, shopping and free parking.

Oak Brook, without a downtown, has a powerhouse open-air mall – yes, mall – that is thriving. In addition to high-end retail, Oakbrook Center has evolved into a destination for gourmets with the likes of The Clubhouse (the best chocolate truffle cake ever), Roka Akor, Rock Sugar, Perry’s Steakhouse and esteemed Mon Ami Gabi. Across the street from the mall, vibrant Gibson’s patio rivals anything in the city.

There are very fine music venues in the ‘burbs, like Fitzgerald’s in Berwyn, which offers top notch live music (jazz, blues, rock, country). On Sundays, Fitzgerald’s showcases big band orchestra music that even I can dance to. Parker’s in Downers Grove is a good bet for live jazz. And if you need a smooth cabaret fix, the Drury Lane in Oakbrook Terrace has you covered. Oh, and they have a terrific line-up of musicals. Oh, and parking is free.

Sweet home suburban Chicago.