In the Fall of 2014, at the CivicLab in the West Loop, I taught a class for the Graham School of the University of Chicago. It was called “What Is a City For?” and took a critical look at the Big Plans that have been ginned up for us over the years. We want to know “Who plans what for who around here?” and “Who profits FROM those plans?” and especially, “Who PAYS for those plans?” You see and download the scheme for the class below.
After reviewing The Burnham Plan, the Bid for the 2016 Olympics, and other Top-Down neoliberal, concrete-heavy, and tourism-centric plans that favored the central business area or white, northern part of Chicago, the students came up with their own plan!
Tom Tresser's Teaching 