Michigan Avenue★5.0

How to Get There

From Downtown Chicago (1 mi): Head to the corner of Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive at the DuSable Bridge, from which the street runs north along the Magnificent Mile and south past Millennium Park and the Art Institute.

Overview

Michigan Avenue is a north-south street in Chicago which runs at 100 east on the Chicago grid. The northern end of the street is at Lake Shore Drive on the shore of Lake Michigan in the Gold Coast Historic District. The street's southern terminus is at Sibley Boulevard in the southern suburb of Harvey.

The street is home to the Chicago Water Tower, the Art Institute of Chicago, Millennium Park, and the shopping on the Magnificent Mile. It includes all of the Historic Michigan Boulevard District and most of the Michigan-Wacker Historic District, including the urban space anchored by the DuSable (Michigan Avenue) Bridge.

Today, the area north of the Chicago River is referred to as the "Magnificent Mile". It contains a mixture of upscale department stores, restaurants, high-end retailers, office buildings and hotels, and caters primarily to tourists and the affluent. The area also has a high concentration of the city's advertising agencies and major media firms, including the Chicago Tribune.

It is the home of Chicago's famous Water Tower landmark, Water Tower Park with its historic clock, as well as the eight-level Water Tower Place shopping center. North of the shopping center can be found the famous John Hancock Center, the art deco Palmolive Building (also known as the Playboy Building) and the lavish Drake Hotel.

From the River southwards

For a few blocks on both sides of the Chicago River, the road is double-decked, including the bridge over the river. The lower level north of the river is where the famous Billy Goat Tavern is located, and south of the river it intersects with Lower Wacker Drive. On the upper lever, tall office buildings and hotels line both sides of the Avenue, until Millennium Park.

The portion of Michigan Avenue opposite Grant Park is the Chicago Landmark Historic Michigan Boulevard District. Major cultural institutions, such as the Chicago Cultural Center, Symphony Center, and the Auditorium Theater are located here, as are many late 19th and early 20th century skyscrapers. In 2009, the Chicago Cultural Mile Association was created to bring "awareness of the unique strengths and diverse offerings available to visitors" in this portion of Michigan Avenue.

The Art Institute of Chicago is across the boulevard, in Grant Park along the Avenue. Several large historic hotels are located just south of Ida B. Wells Drive, including the Hilton Towers Chicago (formerly, the Stevens Hotel), the Congress Plaza Hotel and the Blackstone Hotel. Between them is the Spertus Institute of Jewish Studies.

The Avenue extends south into Near South Side, Chicago and beyond - past what was once the Levee District, the homes of the Prairie Avenue District, the historic Second Presbyterian Church, the former home of the legendary Chess Records and the site where the Lexington Hotel, a hideout of Al Capone, once stood.

South of Cermak Road is the Motor Row District, a historic strip along Michigan Avenue that was home to many early 20th century automobile "palaces." A point of interest in this area is the former Illinois Automobile Club, which later was used as the home of the Chicago Defender, a prominent African-American Chicago newspaper. A little bit further south is Bronzeville, a historic black community in Chicago. Points of interest include the historic Mercy Hospital and Medical Center, the Illinois College of Optometry and the South Side Community Art Center.

The intersection of Michigan Avenue and 35th Street is home to two important local institutions. On the northwest corner is De La Salle Institute, a Catholic high school which was attended by future Chicago mayors Richard J. Daley, Richard M. Daley, and Michael Bilandic. On the southwest corner is the Chicago Police Department Headquarters. Michigan Avenue continues through the South Side and dead ends at 63rd Street, just north of a rail yard and parking lots.

The Avenue continues heading south at 66th Street to Marquette Road, where it moves a half-block to the east back into alignment with the run north of 63rd Street. It then continues south to 89th Street where it dead ends once again for a housing subdivision and a railroad line. It resumes at 91st Street heading south through the working class Roseland community, featuring a large commercial strip along Michigan between 111th and 115th streets. The street dead ends again at 127th Street just before the Cal-Sag Channel. It begins again in the south suburb of Riverdale before finally terminating at Sibley Boulevard or IL RT-83.

This article uses material from the Wikipedia article "Michigan Avenue (Chicago)", which is released under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share-Alike License 3.0