Burj Dubai

http://www.burjdubai.com/

Discussion of classmates' blogs

While reading my a lot of my fellow classmates’ blogs, I discovered how important transportation is and how it is badly needed in the city. The CTA is the main transportation system that I read about and there are many different issues that have yet to be resolved. Such issues as remodeling the CTA train cars, building more train stations, and enforcing better train rules are all things that I agree should be changed about the its current system. In Michelle’s blog titled “CTA Booster,” it was great to read that someone else shares the same thoughts and views about how much improvement the CTA can use. Seeing as that I am a daily CTA rider, I would like to ride in a more cleanly environment where I will not see stains and dirt marks all over the seats. Since CTA rides can be very long and I sometimes fall asleep on my ride from school to work, it would also be a great convenience for video monitors to be capable of telling people what the next stop is and the estimated time of arrival. I think it would also be very a great idea for the CTA to hire security guards to monitor the trains at major stops so that graffiti and other attempts of vandalism can be better prevented.
In Diego’s blog about CTA transportation, he mentioned how the CTA should add another station by the United Center where there is always large crowds. This is a neat idea and I believe it can be done sometime in the future with all of the passengers’ fares that the CTA receives.

Census

The census track is very useful for finding out facts about your city. When I researched my hometown Dolton Illinois, I was not surprised by most of the statistics because the numbers match what I have seen of Dolton over the years. I am however astounded that the average family size is around three because from what I’ve seen families seem to be very large around my neighborhood. Another statistic that was mentioned in class was how females usually outnumber males regardless of the city or town people live in because females tend to live longer than males.

When I searched Dolton’s housing units, I seen that the property values are really low and the average income is about 20,000 dollars. This is once again no surprise for me because referring back to my last post on Cabrini-Green, I mentioned how all of the residents migrated to the south-suburbs which includes towns such as Calumet-City, South Holland, and Dolton. With these increasing population numbers, comes large poverty amongst families. After seeing this fact, I am hoping that a lot of negative things in my town can change for the better in the next census track.

Although I like the census track and I think it is very helpful with giving the state of Illinois a fair amount of representatives, I think that it lacks a couple of components. I believe that if the census track would be much more efficient if it listed other headings that didn’t just pertain to households. For instance, I would have liked to see the number of crimes committed in my city, the number of students attending college, and etc,

Crime in Chicago

Although we know the city of Chicago has a lot of issues that have yet to be resolved, one of the main issues that concern me is the crime rate. Chicago crime had started in the 1960s and reached its peak in the 1970s. Around the year 2002, the crime rate had lessened significantly but the murder rate was still higher than the leading cities Los Angeles and New York. In the local news, I constantly hear about crime occurring in the inner city where most minorities and low-income families reside. This would include Chicago’s south and west side where a lot of homicides and gang violence are affiliated.

In my opinion, I believe that the problem with violence and gangs can never be truly resolved but it could be lessened if the criminal justice system enforced better sentences. I say that the criminal justice system can be better because a lot of major crimes are lightly punished. For instance, an example would be a time when a young girl was sexually assaulted on Chicago’s Westside while she was walking home from school. Once the criminal was caught, he was only sentenced for a couple of years and then released back into the streets to continue committing crimes and assaulting younger women. I believe a really good solution to the problem would be to give these criminals longer sentences and also provide them with helpful resources to help them change their ways. Resources include guidance counselors and former criminals who have changed their lives for the better and no longer violate others.

The Metro Chicago Immigration Factbook

The article titled The Metro Chicago Immigration Factbook was very interesting in that it talked about all of the different ethic groups residing in Chicago and how the populations of each ethnic community fluctuate from year to year. One major topic that comes to my mind when immigration is involved is over-population. I am very concerned with this topic because the more people that come into the U.S., lessens the available spaces in the work force. Although I think that everyone should have equal opportunity to work the same jobs regardless of what background they are from, I also believe that a lot of qualified people are left without jobs because resources are scare.
Immigration can also be very costly because there would have to be a huge addition of schools for the added population. An addition of schools would not only bring the government in to help with funding, but it would also call for major help in Chicago’s city planning development. I believe that problems would increase because city planners would have to decide what landscapes they must replace with new school buildings. In a way this is a good idea but it is more so an inconvenience in areas that are cluttered and have no very public spaces used for parks, recreational centers, and etc.I am hoping that in the future, developers will come up with a better plan to balance both the incoming population and also our economy’s landscape to accompany everybody’s life needs.

Relfections and Impressions of Chicago

Chicago is a wonderful city in that there is so much to see and explore. After viewing pictures of the city from websites such as Revealing Chicago and Picturing Chicago, I was reminded of why I love my city so much. Both websites provide excellent detail oriented photographs that would give tourists a first hand look at our best landscapes and features. When I compare the two websites, I get different emotions and thoughts about Chicago’s environment. Even though both sights showed the highlights of Chicago and what it has to offer, I prefer the website Revealing Chicago because the pictures are much more colorful and vibrant. With the first website, a lot of thoughts come to mind about beautiful landscapes, nightlife, and architecture. I do not get this same feeling when I look at the second website because the pictures are very dull and they only remind me of the low-income side of Chicago.

If I was able to buy a high mega-pixel camera and tour Chicago my pictures would be very different from the two websites Revealing Chicago and Picturing Chicago. Unlike these two websites, I would want to photograph people and events that are going to give a more realistic view of what currently goes on in Chicago. For instance, an example of a great picture would be a snap shot of people shopping on Michigan Ave. because it shows the busyness and diversity of the city. Not only would viewers get a sneak peak at Chicago’s diverse population, but they would also get to view the buildings and the scenery in the background of the photo.

Caprini-Green

In Chicago there are many places that deal with gentrification. One particular area that really comes to my mind is Cabrini-Green which is located on Chicago’s north side. Over the years I have personally observed the drastic transformation of the once very notorious area called Cabrini-Green into a combination of high-rise buildings and row houses which creates a mixed income residential area.

Although I agree that destroying these buildings and forcing all of it’s’ residents to move out was the best decision, I also believe that it only brought the problem else where and did not truly fix it. Once all of the residents had to move out, they had to think of other residential areas that would be suitable for them financially. One of the first areas to come to mind would be no other than my home town Dolton, Illinois and other surrounding areas nearby. I believe a lot of their residents chose this place to reside because it houses a lot of low-middle class income families. Once the majority of these people got settled into my district, a lot of problems started to occur. Problems such as property values going down, crime rates rising, and more children dropping out of school are only a short list of my districts’ downfall. Not too long ago, I was even contacted by a local neighbor who informed me that my house was broken into. Using my blog as an example of an economic problem, I am hoping that better housing solutions can be created in the near future.