Three years ago, a proposal by the prestigious Latin School to build a soccer field on public land in Lincoln Park prompted such a hue and cry from neighbors that the agreement was scrapped.
Reaction to a new Chicago Park District partnership has been decidedly quieter.
The Broadway Armory Park in the Edgewater neighborhood is about to see its summer schedule upended so an elevated running track can be built above the gymnasium for Loyola University’s track team.
The school is paying for about half of the estimated $1.7 million track and the Park District the other half. In return for $850,000 over five years, Loyola’s runners will be allowed exclusive use of the new track for 21/2 hours per day on weekdays during the school year.
A community group and new Ald. Harry Osterman, 48th, said people in the area are excited they will get to use the 200-meter Olympic-style indoor track that likely wouldn’t get built unless Loyola pitched in.
Park District officials say Chicagoans realize in these tough times that outside money is needed to make some improvements.
“Given the current financial situation, right now I think people appreciate the importance of public-private partnerships,” said Park District spokeswoman Jessica Maxey-Faulkner.
But park advocacy groups question why the district is rushing to build a track just because Loyola wants one.
“There has been no long-term study by the Park District showing that an indoor track is needed at that location,” said Erma Tranter, president of Friends of the Parks.
The Park District can scant afford to pour scarce funds into the track project simply because Loyola has agreed to cover half the cost, Tranter said. “I’m sure the track will be a nice amenity, but there are many more basic needs the Park District should be meeting first,” she said.
Maxey-Faulkner countered that the Park District is pursuing a wider track program, and is “happy to make the upfront investment” in exchange for the Loyola payments that will stretch taxpayer dollars.
Construction will begin in mid-June and last until October, she said. In the meantime, Broadway Armory summer programs that use the gymnasium will have to be moved. A popular gymnastics class will be held at nearby Senn High School, she said.
The Edgewater Community Council, a local organization that collected 22,000 signatures as part of a successful push in the mid-1990s to convince the state not to sell the armory building, likes having Loyola as a partner. “Loyola has shown a strong commitment to improving the community,” said Duke Alden, the group’s president.
The community council’s concerns were answered when the gymnastics program and other summer activities found homes in nearby facilities during track construction, Alden said.
Loyola leaders say the university has little room for expansion because it sits in the densely populated North Side near the lakefront. The school maintains it has worked hard to maintain good relations with its neighbors. “The community, for the most part, doesn’t see us as the big bad wolf,” Loyola spokeswoman Jennifer Clark said.
The Latin School fracas erupted over an arguably higher profile piece of Chicago parkland.
The school offered to pay nearly $2 million to build an artificial turf soccer field at the south end of Lincoln Park in exchange for first dibs on using it. But the agreement with the Park District led to a 2008 lawsuit by a residents’ group called Protect Our Parks, which alleged the deal was an illegal land grab by the school.
Under a settlement, the district agreed to terminate its contract with the school and completed the soccer field on its own.
Tom Tresser, president of Protect Our Parks during the soccer field fight, cautioned against assuming the lack of a public outcry over the Broadway Armory deal means people are ready to give up access to public parks to private groups.
“It could be because the armory is inside, not a lakefront park that’s a jewel in Chicago’s crown and really pushes a lot of buttons,” Tresser said of the response to the Loyola agreement.
But Bob O’Neill, president of the Grant Park Conservancy, said deals with schools and corporations will continue to be important.
“There’s no doubt a lot of these projects going forward — unless we’re going to raise property taxes — are going to need to be funded through some kind of partnership,” O’Neill said.
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