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National Geographic : 1919 Jan
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THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE Illinois Central Railroad, the value of the ground thus reclaimed will be forty-six million dollars. But it will cost the city nothing! All that Chicago will have to do is to con struct the necessary retaining walls, with the consent of the Federal Government, and then collect $3,ooo,ooo000-more than enough to reimburse the city for these walls-from the people who need a dumping ground. When this ground has been reclaimed, and Grant Park connected with Lincoln Park, there will be a lakeside playground some fourteen miles long. The people of every section of the city will be brought within a you - don't - have - to - transfer street-car trip to the Lake Front play ground; and Chicago, indeed, will be its own Atlantic City. One need only ride along the Lake Shore Drive and Sheridan Road to see how beautiful such reclaimed ground can be made. CIICAGO's MAIL POUCI Another element in the transformation of the Chicago of yesterday into the Chi cago of tomorrow is the question of an adequate post-office. A vast proportion of the nation's mail between the East and the West passes through Chicago, mak ing it of national as well as of local con cern that adequate facilities be provided. Heretofore the federal authorities have never been able to look far enough ahead, with the result that before a new post office was completed the city had already outgrown it. In the early eighties a building was erected on the site of the present post-office, and had to be torn down ten years later because of its in adequacy. Then the present structure was erected, and for ten years, while it was building, the city had to get along with a makeshift. The present structure is not yet two decades old, but everybody realizes its utter inadequacy. So Chicago induced the railroads plan ning to build a new Union Station to move their site two blocks further south than they had intended, leaving two mag nificent squares between that station and the Northwestern Station. Nearly two thirds of the mail handled in and through Chicago passes between the railroads using these two terminals. The volume of the postal business of the city reaches almost unbelievable pro portions. Two billion pieces of mail are handled annually, and the receipts are greater than those of any other post office in the world. The business done at this one office is eight times as great as that of the entire postal system of Nor way and four times as great as that of the Kingdom of Holland. The parcel post business exceeds that of any other five cities in the United States. The site and building of the present post-office cost the government one mil lion dollars. Such has been the enhance ment of realty values that it is estimated to be worth twelve million dollars to day-the enhancement of value alone being sufficient to take care of the con struction of the proposed new two-block post-office. Since the present building was completed the postal business of the city has quintupled. Having seen the results of a pinch penny policy in the past, Chicago is now asking the government to put up an ade quate post-office outside of the Loop District. TIlE AMAZING LOOP DISTRICT That district, not more than a quarter of a square mile in area, has only nine teen streets in it, with street-cars on all but four of them. It is entered daily by twenty-odd thousand street-cars and more than 130,000 vehicles. A million and a half people traverse its streets every day, and a quarter of a million work there. To get the post-office out side of this jammed district is agreed by all to be one of the prime requirements of the Chicago Plan. Undertaking improvements that in the end will cost some two hundred million dollars, improvements that will make the city one of greater wealth and better health, improvements that will make it compare with any other city on earth in the development of the esthetic side of the life of the community, improvements that will serve as an inspiration and as a model for urban development for all communities, the people of Chicago ask the nation to help them only by giving them an adequate post-office, for which they pay many times over, and to recog-
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