The Road Not Taken

 Today, Michele and I will drive around looking at buildings that are part of a city-wide open house sponsored by the Chicago Architecture Foundation.  With luck, I won’t get too mad over what might have been.  Think Wrigley Field, only at 35^th and Shields.

I belonged to a group that wanted to preserve and renovate the real Comiskey Park.  We proposed turning it into a working national monument for the national pastime, complete with an archive of oral histories provided by former ballplayers.  The White Sox wanted no part of us or the past.  If we don’t get our way, they threatened, we’re going to move to Florida, to the indoor monstrosity that is now home to the Tampa Rays.  I kid you not.  Never have local and state leaders united in collective cowardice as when they gave the Sox and Jerry Reinsdorf the free stadium he felt he was entitled to.

The thing I never understood about Reinsdorf is he’s supposed to be some sort of genius when it comes to real estate, but he’d done nothing in 35-plus years to help develop the area around either ballpark his team has played in on 35^th Street.  Rather, ever since the Cell opened in 1991, Reinsdorf has been intent on channeling the spending of all dollars inside the stadium, beyond what people pay to park at the “iffy” lots.  Cub fans get Wrigleyville, Sox fans stand in line at the concession stands.  The lines aren’t long, though, because who wants to see bad baseball?

In my fantasy world, Comiskey Park stands resplendent, the white paint Bill Veeck slapped on it peeled away.  Those glorious arches again stretch from behind home down the lines and across the outfield.  Researchers hit the archives; fans choose from all the new bars and restaurants that have gone up; a power hitter like Kyle Schwarber hits a ball over the roof in right into the light standards.  And in my wildest dream, we trade for Schwarber.