<story><title>Raising of Chicago</title><url>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_of_Chicago</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jasode</author><text>On a related note for anyone who has walked around both Manhattan and downtown Chicago...&lt;p&gt;Ever notice how downtown Chicago has much less noise of honking cars than downtown New York City?  A friend pointed out it&amp;#x27;s because of Chicago&amp;#x27;s lower-level streets[0] that a lot of service vehicles use for loading&amp;#x2F;unloading.  That&amp;#x27;s in contrast to Manhattan where everybody has to share the same street level.  E.g. a brown UPS truck that stops for a mere 20 seconds is enough for the yellow cab driver that&amp;#x27;s stuck behind him to smash on the horn with impatience.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Multilevel_streets_in_Chicago&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Multilevel_streets_in_Chicago&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>marzell</author><text>I just returned from my first trip to Chicago, and noticed some related things when comparing to other large cities I&amp;#x27;m familiar with.&lt;p&gt;Related to honking and street noise, another factor I noticed is a high number of curbs where parking is simply not allowed. This streamlines traffic in some ways, as people aren&amp;#x27;t fighting over spaces or waiting for someone to back in slowly. Although, there was a lot of &amp;quot;hazard parking&amp;quot; where people just stopped where they weren&amp;#x27;t supposed to. A lot of the honking I witnessed was due to freight&amp;#x2F;waste vehicles blocking an entire street (2-4 lanes) so they could back into a dock or service area in the middle of a block.&lt;p&gt;Downtown at night seemed eerily quiet, although there were a good number of people. I think several factors applied here, when compared with SF... Chicago has been built to handle the vast crowds from events and conventions that swarm the city. When that isn&amp;#x27;t happening, there is comparatively more room for people, so it&amp;#x27;s wide sidewalks aren&amp;#x27;t as crowded. Also, being built to withstand harsh winters, I imagine there is better thermal insulation that also acts as decent audio insulation (plus a lot is happening under the street level!). I was right outside blues and jazz clubs where you couldn&amp;#x27;t actually hear that anything was going on inside (this makes me laugh when compared to visiting Nashville for the first time earlier in the year).&lt;p&gt;It also seemed that the contention between drivers, cyclists, and pedestrians is more severe even than SF, where I saw several interactions that seemed more like a macho game of &amp;quot;chicken&amp;quot;.</text></comment>
<story><title>Raising of Chicago</title><url>https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raising_of_Chicago</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>jasode</author><text>On a related note for anyone who has walked around both Manhattan and downtown Chicago...&lt;p&gt;Ever notice how downtown Chicago has much less noise of honking cars than downtown New York City?  A friend pointed out it&amp;#x27;s because of Chicago&amp;#x27;s lower-level streets[0] that a lot of service vehicles use for loading&amp;#x2F;unloading.  That&amp;#x27;s in contrast to Manhattan where everybody has to share the same street level.  E.g. a brown UPS truck that stops for a mere 20 seconds is enough for the yellow cab driver that&amp;#x27;s stuck behind him to smash on the horn with impatience.&lt;p&gt;[0] &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Multilevel_streets_in_Chicago&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;Multilevel_streets_in_Chicago&lt;/a&gt;</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>gecko</author><text>This was supposed to be a key aspect of the original idea for EPCOT, too: streets would be tri-level, cars on the lowest level, delivery trucks on the next level, and above-ground restricted to pedestrians. You can see &lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;EPCOT_(concept)&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;en.wikipedia.org&amp;#x2F;wiki&amp;#x2F;EPCOT_(concept)&lt;/a&gt; for more information.</text></comment>