WBBM Traffic Reporter Steven Haas Shares His Advice
After spending many years keeping drivers up to date on Chicago area traffic, you know Newsradio 780 AM overnight traffic reporter Steven Haas has insight into Chicagoland traffic.
We invited Haas to give readers the lowdown on what to expect this long holiday weekend while in your car.
Labor Day holiday traffic always sucks.
This year, it’s going to suck worse than last year according to AAA.
The Chicago-based motorist organization estimates a 9.9% increase in the number of people traveling this holiday weekend compared to 2009. In the Chicago area, AAA estimates 1.92 people will be on the road this weekend, an 11.3% increase [...]
GEEK EDITOR’S NOTE: Jay Stone is one, if not the only person officially in the running in the 2011 Chicago mayoral campaign.
Stone is making the parking meter lease deal one of the main issues of his campaign and estimates Chicago has lost billions of dollars over the 75 years of the lease.
Here’s the first of [...]
Parking frustration.
That’s the inspiration for the Central Lakeview Merchant’s Association’s month long promotion kicking off this Saturday.
This local chamber of commerce for the Lakeview neighborhood is offering shoppers a free $10 roll of quarters if they just spend $100 at two or more participating businesses between August 28th and September 30th.
“The issue was the quantity [...]
Redflex Demands More Cash From Toll Road Firm Macquarie
By The Newspaper
Redflex, the company that has the contract for Chicago’s red light camera program has recently been the target of a corporate takeover by Macquarie, a company that coincidentally operates the Skyway toll road.
Redflex Traffic Systems reported Tuesday to the Australian Securities Exchange that it had [...]
After spending many years keeping drivers up to date on Chicago area traffic, you know Newsradio 780 AM overnight traffic reporter Steven Haas has insight into Chicagoland traffic.
We invited Haas to give readers the lowdown on what to expect this long holiday weekend while in your car.
Labor Day holiday traffic always sucks.
This year, it’s going to suck worse than last year according to AAA.
The Chicago-based motorist organization estimates a 9.9% increase in the number of people traveling this holiday weekend compared to 2009. In the Chicago area, AAA estimates 1.92 people will be on the road this weekend, an 11.3% increase over last year.
AAA’s director of Public Affairs, Beth Mosher, attributes these increased numbers to an improving economy.
Last week we reported on the Central Lakeview Merchant’s Association (CLMA), which is passing out free rolls of quarters for any shopper spending more than $100 at area stores.
The CLMA is trying to promote business in their neighborhood by helping drivers offset the increased and increasing cost of metered parking.
But TimeOut Chicago spent some time talking to store owners in the area and found that most of them think the increased meter rates due to Daley’s parking meter privatization deal is pricing some shoppers out of the neighborhood.
Dear PTG,
I have an ethical question for you.
There is a car that has been parked on my block for over a month–they were doing street construction farther down the block so they seem to have skipped the street cleaning. I know that the law says one week max, but this is not about the law, it is about what is right.
I wouldn’t normally care in the summer but for the fact that the car is taking up two spaces instead of one–it is parked at the beginning of the block and is parked about a half a cars length behind the yellow line so that no car can park in front of it.
I feel like a cranky old man with this get off my lawn behavior, but parking is really a problem where I live and I have difficulty feeling sorry for someone who parks in such an inconsiderate manner. So, what are your thoughts?
Brandon
Ethical question? No comprende “ethics” Brandon.
Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mark Brown is back on the story of the defective Chicago city stickers.
Brown, who did some initial coverage on the city stickers that would not stick story back in June at the same time this site covered the issue, is back to do some followup.
He interviews a spokesperson for SecureMark, the “local” decal company that was the lowest bidder for this year’s city sticker and through 2014, who claims SecureMark went out of its way to fix the problem.
The only thing keeping the Chicago Cubs out of the cellar in the NL Central is the lowly Pittsburgh Pirates.
And those under performing Pirates come to Chicago and open up a three game stand against the Cubs with two back to back night games.
First pitch is at 7:05 both Monday and Tuesday evening.
This deep in the season, Chicago drivers should know the drill by now: stay the heck out of Wrigleyville/Lakeview if you don’t have the proper residential permit parking stickers, guest passes or private parking.
GEEK EDITOR’S NOTE: Jay Stone is one, if not the only person officially in the running in the 2011 Chicago mayoral campaign.
Stone is making the parking meter lease deal one of the main issues of his campaign and estimates Chicago has lost billions of dollars over the 75 years of the lease.
Here’s the first of a three part series.
By Jay Stone
Chicago Lost One Billion Dollars or More in Revenue
Daley sold the rights to Chicago’s parking meters for $1.15 billion. Most American cities would consider $1.15 billion a financial bonanza, but the critics of the Chicago parking meter deal strongly disagree. Chicago’s Inspector General’s office said the Daley administration undervalued the parking asset by $1 billion.
Be careful if you’re driving on the South Side Saturday morning.
The Chicago Department of Transportation and the Chicago Police Department will be doing crosswalk enforcement at three locations between 8 AM and approximately 2 PM.
Cops posing as peds will try to cross the street at the crosswalk. If you don’t stop to let the faux pedestrian to cross the street, you will be ticketed anywhere from $50-$500.
PLEASE! Slow down, drive carefully, watch out for and be respectful of pedestrians. Not just today but every day.
Here’s the three locations:
Safe to say, the City Clerk’s office was a tad embarrassed back in early June.
After getting the city sticker season off to a fast and healthy start with record breaking online sales, something happened.
Reports of city stickers that wouldn’t stick to car windshields started trickling in. The trickle turned into a flood and after some quick checking, the Clerk’s office realized they had a bit of a fiasco on their hands. An aggressive campaign to alert drivers of free replacements for defective city stickers ensued, a two week extension of the grace period was announced, and so far, over 55,000 (approximately 5% of total sales) city stickers have been replaced since mid-June.
But now, concerned some drivers who unwittingly received a defective sticker and hadn’t heard about issue and/or the free replacement policy, the Clerk’s office is reaching out again to a select number of city drivers with a postcard mailing.
“Happy Friday!”
Yeah, it’s the last Friday of the month and that means a few thousand bike riders will take to Chicago’s streets this evening for Critical Mass.
For whatever reason, the route is being kept under wraps until the Mass steps off at 6:00 PM from Daley Center. The ride, we’re told, has been getting a little bit of heat from CPD lately, so this may be an effort to keep attention from the cops to a minimum.
