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have you ever noticed a weird part of the #chicago street grid that doesn& #39;t line up with the rest of the neighborhood? usually they can be traced back to old real estate speculation or disused infrastructure. here are some of the oddities in #bridgeport.
in the triangle between 31st st and archer avev there are several streets that are too close together. farrell st, keeley st, elias ct, loomis st, and gratten ave.
most of these streets are also very small rights of way and the houses are very close to the sidewalk. some of them have properties facing only one way, and those properties alternate direction often, meaning these streets are also alleys.
These little courts look very different from the wide tree-lined streets that are common in the rest of the neighborhood and city.
the offset from the rest of the grid that was laid out on the north side of archer ave began with a single small speculative development that created keeley st, at what is now the intersection of keeley/31st/morgan by maria& #39;s bar.
you can see on this map from the early 1860s that the original properties sold off by the city all lined up well with the standard chicago grid of 330& #39; between street centerlines. farrell st already existed in the blocks directly north and south of archer ave.
yet for some reason, a man whose name i cannot locate decided he did not want to work with his neighbors to develop his land and theirs in a cohesive manner. this created the tiny offset of only 150& #39; between the extended centerlines of keeley and farrell streets
2 - the other part of the bridgeport grid that is well-known for being awkward is only a few blocks south of keeley and 31st. known as "brown& #39;s addition," it is bounded by halsted, morgan, 35th, and (kinda) 33rd.
you can see where the "kinda" comes from when looking at a map where 33rd st jogs up about 100 feet as it crosses halsted.
when archer ave was built in 1831 through the north end of what would become bridgeport, it was known as "the road to widow brown& #39;s." i can& #39;t tell for sure if this is the same brown that later started developing this addition in the 1860s.
again, on this 1860s map you can see that the gridline for 33rd st was very clearly established. back then it was known as "lyon ave" and it ran all the way up to brown& #39;s property at halsted.
i can& #39;t tell exactly when the original plats were acquired by these people, but the line between egan& #39;s property and brown& #39;s property for some reason did not line up with the lines between every other property literally for miles, and they both just said "fuck it"
it& #39;s very interesting to me how such small details can affect the layout and feel of a neighborhood for so many generations after.
