Urban Land Banking Prairie In Chicago
Yesterday’s post was about an interesting parking garage in Chicago, today is the story of why I went up to the top of the garage.
![A long block was a prairie with native grades & flowers, it looked well kept because a wide border was mowed.](http://www.urbanreviewstl.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/northwesternprairie1.jpg)
![From the top of the adjacent parking garage you can see fenced-in prairie.](http://www.urbanreviewstl.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2014/08/northwesternprairie2.jpg)
My assumption is this is a way of land banking until Northwestern decides to build on the land. The block held a large zig-zag 1940s/50s building, razed sometime within the last decade. The block is fenced, it isn’t used as a park. Land here, between Lake Shore Drive and Michigan Avenue, is much too valuable to sit vacant. The campus map doesn’t identify it.
The result is a very neat looking, but easy to maintain, block.
— Steve Patterson