Shaping Chicago: An Archive | Community-Engaged Design, Sense of Ownership, and Trust in Chicago
"The city is ours," said Walter D. Moody, the Managing Director of the Chicago Planning Commission in 1911, "...because the people of a city always make it what it is." Chicago has a long and storied past with planning, and Shaping Chicago takes a look at that history and uses it to contextualize the relationship between trust, ownership, and the many ways Chicago residents engage in shaping their city today: from attending community meetings, to buying previously vacant city-owned land, to taking the initiative to fix things themselves without waiting for the city's input or permission. This project compiles the historical narrative of Chicago planning; relevant neighborhood level data on trust in local government, city-owned vacant lots, graffiti reports, and more; and quotes from interviews I've conducted with community-engagement professionals, planners, and residents into a website that will serve as a digital archive and resource from which people can learn more about Chicago's urban fabric and how urban planning and community dynamics collide.
Researcher: LyLena Estabine