Over the weekend I practiced some street photography in parts of the city experimenting with pedestrianization. This is a rather alien concept to most Americans—myself included—and this is my first real experience with the phenomenon of barring car traffic from certain roads in favor of walkers and cyclists. It’s such an odd feeling, exiting a building and stepping off the sidewalk directly into the street. It feels wrong!
At the same time, dodging the carcasses of squirrels flattened under tires and exploded pigeons, I found myself feeling surprisingly at ease. We cede so much of our environment to cars, and when we finally get the chance to use 100% of our built space, there’s this glee of boundary-crossing, when in actuality it’s more like a reclamation.
Where usually was the rush of spotless trucks and gargantuan SUVs, instead I saw such a wonderful conflagration of humanity. Am I giving too much credit to a crowd of shoppers on a Sunday afternoon in a rich Northside neighborhood? Perhaps. At the same time, it’s this tiniest of feelings of positivity in a time and a place that threatens so much unrelenting negativity.
Wicker Park, 2025
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