The pedestrian highway in Chicago was a massive system of walkways connecting buildings in
the city's largest university. For thirty years, this sprawling canopy of concrete and
granite ushered thousands of students between classes, hosted protests, and even served
as a location for films. But, as time caught up to it, it began to deteriorate and maintenance
became increasingly difficult. This is until the decision was made to tear it down. And
today, only scars, stubby remnants, and photographs remain. But we’re going to rebuild this
piece of urban infrastructure, in the computer, and see what it would have been like to experience
this bold, innovative, but ultimately ill-fated design. Stay tuned.
Hello, my name is Stewart Hicks and I teach architecture design studios and lecture courses
at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Long before I started teaching here, the campus looked a totally differently than it does
today. It used to be covered with an entire elevated walkway system that would take you
from one building to the next. Today, that huge system exists in only in photographs
and urban legend. And we mostly enter buildings on the ground floor, which is not where the
architect intended for us to.
After years of navigating the campus in its current state, I wanted to see what it would
have been like to navigate the pedestrian highway. So, we built the entire thing in
the computer in order walkthrough through it in real time using a program called Enscape.
And, there is a link the description that will take you to the model so you can explore
it yourself in your browser window.
The video is broken into segments in the timeline because I’m also going to tell the history
of this massive projrectt, analyze its original design, and offer some thoughts on its demolition.
So, without any further ado, let’s dive into the brutalist pedestrian highway beginning
with the timeline.
Timeline The University of Illinois Circle Campus was
designed and built just SW of the Chicago Loop in the mid 1960s by the architect Walter
Netsch working with the firm Skidmore Owings and Merril.
Walter Netsch was born in 1920 in Chicago and attended MIT from 1939 to 1943. He began
working for Skidmore Owings and Merrill in 1947 where he eventually became partner until
his retirement in 1979.
During his time at SOM, Netsch would be responsible for the design of some notable and important
buildings like the Inland Steel Building in 1957. It was the first skyscraper built in
the Chicago loop after WW2. After decades of a skyscraper drought, the building type
had to be reinvented and Netsch questioned what a skyscraper should be at a fundamental
level by locating all vertical elements like structure and elevators outside the main part
of the building.
Also around this time, Netsch was working on the Airforce Academy Campus in Colorado
Springs. Modeled and arranged to increase interactions between cadets. This area was
also designed on a strict modular grid of 7’ based on the size of the bed in a dorm
room. This idea of a strict module would remain an obsession for the architect at UIC which
began design in the early 1960s.
Of course, the airforce campus also houses the chapel as its crown jewel and Netsch’s
most famous building design. the chapel is made of aluminum clad spires in the shape
of tetrahedrons that also serve as the structure of the building.
The UIC circle campus was built as an “instant campus” to house a projected 32,000 students.
This new home was conceived after the university outgrew its home at Navy Pier. It takes its
name from the expressway interchange to its NE.
Construction was phased, but took an astonishingly short amount of time for such a large undertaking.
Phase one saw the construction of the walkways while phases 3 and 4 included buildings that
were part of Netsch’s Field Theory — a design strategy that used overlays of rotated
squares to produce buildings with complex interconnections.
After 25 years, the walkway’s internal heating elements no longer worked. The salt from fighting
chicago winters ate away the concrete stairs, making much of the walkways inaccessible.
All this deterrioration occurred until 1993 when the walkway began the process of demolition
which would take a total of six years.
Majority of the granite damaged during demolition was donated to the City of Chicago, which
used it to build an artificial reef at 57th Street and Lake Shore Drive.
Analysis I think the walkways fit into various ways
the city of chicago works. In the broadest sense, it was a very bold experiment. I mean
this is the city that reversed the flow of the river, and raised all the streets and
building like 10 or 20 feet just to have sewers. This walkway system certainly doesn’t register
on that scale of bold infrastructural projects, but its certainly no small feat.
But, to design and an entire urban campus for this many people on this small a site
had never been attempted before. The pedestrian expressway was a solution to the planned 30,000
students which were expected on a relatively tight site of 100 acres. Of course, the projected
density and number of students was never achieved, making the walkway seem like overkill even
from the outset.
Its also like Chicago because city has other layered systems of movement like wacker drive,
party on top, business on the bottom. Ever seen batman begins?
There’s also the pedways system here in chicago, an underground walkway. Also featured
on batman.
But you know what movie the UIC walkways were featured in? Candyman.
The design for the campus begins here at the forum which was considered the heart where
students would meet in the largest groups. Then the campus is designed like ripples in
water when a stone is dropped in a pond. At the center is where buildings are located
for lectures. Then the classroom buildings are around those, then specialized buildings
for science and architecture.
The campus is large and was built quickly and to achieve this level of intricate coordination
requires a huge investment. Its scale is one reason for its downfall, its inflexible. Cities,
and campuses are living things that are constantly changing and adapting. It exemplifies a top
down way of thinking about these where design is imposed at the outset rather than to develop
gradually over time.
This is probably also a good time to mention that this project displaced thousands of people
and businesses that were already here as part of the fabric of Chicago. This campus and
walkway is certainly fraught with dubious and complicated political decision-making
all around.
The overall design has a clear distinction between major and minor axes. These break
away in a very tree-like manner and curl around to dead ends, even when they terminate right
next to the main artery, they don’t connect. This kind of reminds me of fractals and fractal
- what are fractals. These are connective structures that can be scaled up or down and
take the same form.
Just like the air force academy, the campus follows a strict modular structure based on
20’ squares. This is not a very large module for concrete construction, so the there seems
to be a lot of columns, way more than there are today. Analogies to forests are often
made and reinforced when there are trees placed at every column.
The design features multiple kinds of symmetry and asymmetry. Bilateral symmetry, which is
basically when something is mirrored across a line. And radial symmetry when something
is rotated and copied. These strong bits of symmetry are counteracted by off axis entries
and exits creating a rotational or pinwheel movement.
3d Modeling We modeled the walkways in a program called
Rhino. Modeling the walkways was a chore, its a big project. But luckily there’s a
lot of copying both with modules and with the symmetry. So it was possible to make 1
thing and rotate around 4 times or one column and copy it lots of times.
We also have access to the original drawings, making it pretty easy to build off the architect’s
original intentions.
Walkthrough Walking around this model is really surreal.
I know this place so well but its also like I’m seeing it for the first time.
I have to imagine we’re losing a lot with 3d model. It simply can’t be as detailed
as it would need to be to capture all the textures of the entirety of the campus.
Even armed with that knowledge, the campus and walk way are extremely vast. The placement
and location buildings dont’ provide a sense of enclosure because we’re only seeing the
tops of them. It’s like our view skips over the tops of buildings. The space feels so
monumental. The long axis is so straight and goes on for so long. Sets up awkward relationships
with others as we are always totally exposed.
The forum is almost blindingly light colored. There are mounds that go up and some that
go down. I can see the architects mind at work, offering these objects and scapes to
prompt different forms of collective gatherings of various types. To an architect this might
seem generous and open ended. But visitors probably feel consumed and uninterested in
engaging because they’re so exposed.
While underneath we’re completely concealed. Its dark and there are way too many columns.
It does feel like I’m in lower wacker drive in chicago. But at least there I’m in a
car. There are too kinds of columns, the twisted kind of the central forum, while the long
stretches have rectangular ones. Maybe the twisting ones were expensive.
Takeaways All in all, I’m really glad we did this.
I have a new appreciation for the challenges of designing and running an urban campus,
but also for the architect. Walter Netsch and the UIC campus are figures that can be
vilified for all sorts of reasons. The brutalist architecture can feel alienating, it can come
across as defensive, and inhuman. No matter what the architect’s intentions were, architecture
and building need to live on their own without apology or explainatin. And in this case,
most people’s assumptions about the place are pretty negative even when the architects
intentions were noble.
However, ,my stance is that I appreciate and respect bold experiments. I don’t expect
them to go right all the time, but I support leaving room for experimentation which also
means leaving room for some failures. I also believe in constantly assessing the successes
and failures of the built environment and moving forward. It was probably a good move
to demolish the walkways, but it is sad. They could have probably been removed in a way
that still celebrated the overall vision. There have also been some additions to the
campus that are not good and don’t work well with what was already there.
But, here we are, let’s do the best with what we have and learn our lessons. Now you
two can walk through this monumental urban infrastructure and experience what it would
have been like if you came to chicago in the 1980s! If you like this video and this project
of resurrecting demolished or unbuilt architecture, please give the video a like. Subscribe to
the channel. And, while you’re doing all that, tell me what you think about this project
in the discussion below.