Chicago's most sensational natural feature
is that big inland sea to the east.
And we're unique among world cities
in that almost our entire waterfront is a park.
The 18-mile long lakefront park system
is the signature feature of the 1909 Plan of Chicago,
also known as the Burnham Plan.
(smooth music continues)
Dramatic pedestrian bridges
solved a big problem for south siders.
For many years,
they had a hard time getting to their lakefront park
because they had to cross not only Lake Shore Drive,
but also the Illinois Central railroad
that the city ill-advisedly ran up the south lakefront
in the 1860s.
(smooth music continues)
You can blame the man entombed here for those tracks.
Senator Stephen A. Douglas had an estate here
and cooked up the land grant that allowed the railroad
to come up the lakefront right past his property.
It would take 150 years
to fully reclaim our shoreline for the public.
The tomb features a statue of Douglas
who owned enslaved people.
It towers above the Black neighborhood of Bronzeville,
which has led residents and state legislators
to call for its removal.
(smooth music continues)
South of downtown, the Burnham plan
envisioned a string of manmade islands connected by bridges
to the park along the shore.
But Northerly Island was the only one ever built.
Even before it was completed in 1925,
business leaders were coveting it for an airport,
but the Great Depression put those plans on hold.
Instead, Northerly Island
and a huge swath of the south lakefront
hosted Chicago's second World's Fair,
the Century of Progress in 1933 and 34.
It was a beacon of hope in the depths of the Depression.
The colorful futuristic pavilions
reflecting the theme of scientific progress
were a complete contrast to the classically-inspired
White City of 1893.
The city eventually did claim Northerly Island
for an airport.
Meigs Field opened in 1947.
Flash forward to 2003, Meigs's lease had run out
and Mayor Richard M. Daley, never a fan of the airport,
scrambled bulldozers in a midnight raid.
In the years since,
the land has been slowly converted into a park.
The old modernist terminal building is now a nature center
and the northern end of Northerly Island is a concert venue.
The Burnham Plan called for athletic grounds
where Soldier Field stands today
and the original classical design
certainly would have pleased Burnham.
But like many Chicagoans, he might have been baffled
by the flying saucer that landed on top of it in 2003.
(smooth music continues)
The Field Museum was located here as a compromise.
The Burnham Plan envisioned it
where Buckingham Fountain is today,
but the Illinois Supreme Court blocked that plan,
citing a historic promise
that the lakefront remain forever open, clear,
and free of buildings.
The Field was marooned
between lanes of Lake Shore Drive until 1996.
That's when the northbound lanes were relocated to the west,
forming a museum campus
with two other historic lakefront gems.
The Shedd Aquarium, home to more than fish,
including marine mammals, penguins, and insects.
And the Adler Planetarium,
the first of its kind in the western hemisphere.