Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
217
end of North Avenue Beach in early morning, befor e it opens to the public for the day .
(Also consider that, in off season, all beaches ar e fair game for dogs.)
Beaches officially open with a full retinue of lifeguards on duty beginning about June
20, but swimmers can wade into the chilly water fr om Memorial Day to Labor D ay.
Only the brav est souls v enture into the water befor e July, when the temperatur e creeps
up enough to make swimming an attractiv e proposition. Please take note that not the
entire lakefront is beach, and don 't do anything stupid such as diving off the r ocks. Be
extremely careful with y our kids. The lake has dr op-offs at points along the shor e, and
kids can easily and quickly get into deeper wate. Lake Michigan can develop large waves,
too, so exercise the same caution you would at the ocean.
Oak Street, North Avenue, Loyola, Osterman, Montrose, South Shore, and Rainbow
beaches ar e wheelchair- and str oller-friendly—they offer specially designed mats that
create a path over the sand to the water. For questions about the 29 miles of beaches and
parks along Lake Michigan, call the park district's lakefront region office at
&
312/742-
5239.
2
GREEN CHICAGO: CITY PARKS
Thanks to ar chitect Daniel Burnham and his coterie of visionar y civic planners—who
drafted the r evolutionary 1909 P lan of Chicago in the aftermath of the G reat Chicago
Fire of 1871—the city 's wide-open lakefr ont par k system is unriv aled b y most major
metropolises. Downtown Chicago has two extensive downtown parks: Grant Park on the
southern end of Michigan Avenue, and Lincoln Park, starting at North Avenue.
8
GRANT PARK
Modeled after the gardens at Versailles, Grant Park is Chicago's front yard, composed of
giant lawns segmented b y
allées
of tr ees, plantings, and paths, and pieced together b y
major r oadways and a networ k of railr oad tracks. Co vering the gr eens is a v ariety of
public recreational and cultural facilities (although these ar e few in number and nicely
spread out, a legacy of mail-order magnate Aaron Montgomery Ward's
fin de siècle
cam-
paign to limit municipal buildings in the park). Incredibly, the entire expanse was created
from sandbars, landfill, and Chicago F ire debris; the original shor eline extended all the
way to M ichigan Avenue. Grant Park is the major v enue for festiv als in the city , but
although it's beautiful, it has fewer attractions for families than Lincoln Park (see review
below).
The immense
Buckingham F ountain,
accessible along Congr ess P arkway, is the
baroque centerpiece of the park, composed of pink Georgia marble and patterned after—
but twice the siz e of—the Latona F ountain at Versailles, with adjoining esplanades
beautified by rose gardens in season. Throughout the late spring and summer, the foun-
tain spurts columns of water up to 165 feet in the air , illuminated after dar k by a whirl
Fun Facts
Did You Know?
Buckingham Fountain
's jets and electric light displays are actually controlled by
a computer 700 miles away in Atlanta.
