The 200 block of Pearson Street, just a block east of Michigan Avenue and Water Tower Place in the Streeterville neighborhood, is certainly not secluded.
But it`s a quiet enough place with its rows of tall trees, mainly elms, forming a canopy of green over the pavement. On one side of the street are residential high-rises. On the other is the blank wall of the 77-year-old Illinois National Guard Armory.
But, come February, that`s going to change as the armory is torn down to make way for the new multimillion-dollar home of Chicago`s Museum of Contemporary Art.
And many residents aren`t very happy about it.
It`s not that they don`t want the museum. What they don`t want are huge 16-wheel trailers pulling out onto their street.
They don`t want the traffic congestion that the handful of trailers may cause each month. They don`t want the large garage doors that the trailers will need, or the extra-wide driveway apron.
And they don`t want to see the gap in the overhead canopy of branches and leaves when one of the street`s stately trees is removed to make way for the trailers.
On Thursday, they`ll ask the Chicago Plan Commission to delay approval of the museum`s plans until a better alternative can be worked out.
But officials from the city and from the museum, now in a converted bakery-townhouse at 237 E. Ontario St., say there is no alternative.
The trailers, which are used to transport art exhibits, will be pulling into the museum`s garage, but won`t be able to turn around to go back out onto Chicago Avenue.
The only other option would be to have them back out onto the busy Chicago Avenue, and that`s not safe, said Gregory Longhini, spokesman for the city`s Planning and Development Department.
The trailer question is the last remaining issue between residents and the museum.
Already, at the residents` behest, the plans for the new museum`s sculpture garden have been changed so that it won`t be 16 feet above grade, but will be a series of terraces that will slope down from the east side of the new building to Lake Shore Park.
Kevin Consey, the museum`s director, said the changes already made will drive up the price of the new complex, originally set at $55 million.
But he said he would not say how much higher the cost will be until the Plan Commission has granted its approval to the revised plans.
