Will Chicagoans have to choose between memory of Dan Ryan, Obama?

Will Dan Ryan subside someday … 

Bill Daley’s campaign for Chicago mayor is trying to gain some attention these days with a suggestion that a city-based expressway be named (renamed, actually) for Barack Obama.

Daley offers up a line of logic that other Chicago expressways are named for John F. Kennedy and Dwight Eisenhower – so why not give a president actually from Chicago the same honor?

… to Barack Obama?

ALTHOUGH SOME PEOPLE are speculating that this gesture by Daley is merely something meant to try to sway a share of the black vote to actually think about casting a ballot for him. Something with symbolic value, but little to no actual value in terms of public service.

But what is really causing a stink amongst some people is that Daley is suggesting a portion of Interstates 90 and 94 be used as the Obama Expressway. As in the same portion of highway that for years has been known as the Dan Ryan Expressway!

I-90/94, northwest to O'Hare

State Rep. LaShawn Ford, D-Chicago, who led the effort to rename a central Illinois part of Interstate 55 for Obama, claims that the law prohibits Ryan’s name from being removed. Although Illinois Department of Transportation officials say there are procedures that could allow for the name change.

I-290, west to Tri-State

Although they also told the Chicago Sun-Times they discourage too many changes, saying it can cause confusion amongst the driving public.

SO WHAT’S GOING to become of the Dan Ryan Expressway? Has Dan really outlived his usefulness as a namesake for THE major street cutting through the South Side leading people into and away from the downtown area.

I-55 southwest to Obama Expy

Has it truly been so long that Ryan’s name no longer has political significance? Is “the Ryan” in reference to a daily commute going to be an example of someone thinking in a 20^th Century reference.

Will people living in Chicago in the late 21^st Century think of “the Obama” as the main way of travelling from 95^th Street all the way into the heart of the city – with that view of the one-time Sears Tower looming in the distance; growing taller and taller as we drive closer and closer to it?

Or is the name “Dan Ryan” too sacred to Chicago’s character that it would seem sacrilegious to think of changing it. What next; taking the name “Harold Washington” off of the main building of the Chicago Public Library?

Is Rkchard J.'s name sacrosanct?

OR REMOVING “RICHARD J. Daley from the downtown Civic Center (as in the building with the ‘Picasso” statue out front)?

Actually, I wouldn’t be surprised to learn that many people don’t know who Dan Ryan, Jr. (there also was a Sr. who was politically significant) was.

Both served on the Cook County Board, with Jr. serving as a commissioner from the 1920s to 1954, when he became county board President – a post he held until his death in 1961.

During his time as an elected official, he took a special interest in the development of highways through Chicago, which is what caused the county board to think him worthy of presidents and a former governor (Adlai E. Stevenson II) when it comes to being namesakes for the city’s expressway system.

Will William gain support from Obama move?

NOW IF DALEY (as in William) winds up losing the upcoming mayoral election, this could wind up becoming a moot point. Who knows if anyone else will feel compelled to take up this issue.

It may strike some as an issue far too trivial to expend much time and energy on.

Although I must admit to having one reason to kind of hoping that an Obama Expressway in Chicago becomes a reality someday. We’re in an age where some amongst us are determined to do whatever they can think of to erase memories of Obama or his legacy from our society.

The idea of a highway in Chicago that is federally funded and named for Obama? It would almost be the equivalent of a middle finger in the faces of all those who find things to admire about this Age of Trump we’re now in.

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