Chicago, reminds me of another side or mega project; the Chicago tunnel system. Built to transport coal, remove ashes, and other goods beneath the streets of Chicago using small electric trains (mining locomotives). Shutdown in the Fifties and caused a flood in the Nineties.
I worked in downtown Chicago when the flood happened. Some contractor accidentally breached the wall allowing the river to flood in. I can remember the huge hoses used to pump out the basements. Such a mess.
Yes. The 1993 (1992?) flood was the fault of the City. In the 1940s city leaders confiscated RR tunnels to make way for the new subways. Some tunnels were cut off and forgotten only to be rediscovered by the contractor working in the Chicago River. He found the cutiff tunnel by accidentally poking a hole in it. The story of the underground RR is well told in "Forty Feet Below" magazine style book published in 1980s by Bruce Moffat, a CTA researcher employee.
The commercial tunnel project project in downtown Chicago would in itself likely qualify as a megaproject, but jacking up the entire center of the city doesn't?? Simon, you need to recheck your qualifications for megaprojects.
This is really just one piece of the story. First the city was raised so that sewage would drain into the river. Then the river was reversed so the sewage didn't drain into the lake. More recently a new river was essentially dug 300ft underground so that sewage didn't drain into the actual river.
That's the side project. This was the mega project. Kinda like how Seattle just built a new city on top of the old one. Similar end result to what happened here, but a completely different way of going about it.
@@counterfit5 I agree, I was going back and forth since it involved many smaller projects if that counts or not, but so does many mega projects including planes. Like development of the engines, and then development of the shape and many other factors are smaller projects that culminate into one mega project. In either case I am happy this video about something many people do not know about the city I live near was made. Many people know the city has a lot of big issues, but a lot of problems have been solved here and I don't think Chicago has been given enough credit since we get over shadowed by New York and LA since that is where a lot of the media is made.
While driving on Archer Ave. you would notice older building that have raised sidewalks seemingly leading to the front entrance. As you look down you notice a lower level with a door and window/s. Archer Ave. was a old cattle trail leading to the famous stockyards. They raised Archer Ave. fianally to cover the muddy trail after trains became the way to send animals for processing.
Actually all the diagonal streets in Chicago are old Indian trails except for Elston Ave. which was built as a go around after Milwaukee Ave. was turned into a toll road.
You left out the part where they reversed the flow of the Chicago river. It now runs from Lake Michigan rather than into Lake Michigan. This was done because Lake Michigan is the source of drinking water for the city and the sewage drained into the river. To enter the lake even today from the river you must go through a series of locks. The Chicago river now drains into the Mississippi Watershed.
This is true I wish someone would do a documentary about the time that the entire downtown area flooded because someone sank a piton into the river puncturing a tunnel I worked at City Hall at the time City Hall has three sub basements all of them were flooded we lost a lot of civil war documents. It was very surreal I got called in at 4:00 in the morning I never got my pay for that day either bastards anyway it's a hell of a thing to go to your workplace and find fish floating around in ankle deep water knowing that three basements below you are completely flooded thanks again
I figured it should have been on Mega Projects more for the sheer scale of the project and the fact that they literally jacked the city up with jacks. That they did so in 2 decades is all the more impressive. As well as that they did part of this project during the Civil War is also of some note.
OK Simon, Chicago actually has several mega projects stories. This one, the 40 feet below mail railroad, the el and subway, changing the direction of the river, the water pumping stations, the white city Columbian expo, rebuilding after the 1871 fire, 1931 expo, and did you do something on the deep tunnel, I've lost track.
Chicagoan here! Sounds weird to hear people who aren’t from Chicago say our street names. I appreciate this video though, I never knew the full story of how our city was raised
I think the idea of "lesser quality" buildings being carted out of the city quite hilarious, most other places would have just demolished them and told the less-affluent occupants to sod off... :P
I think it would have been the cost at the time. Remember this was Chicago late 1850's early 1860's. The American Civil War was brewing something fierce, and marshes aren't really well known for their lumber supply. It's the city that proposed the plan and so the city did what it could to accommodate those people, who probably couldn't afford another house the city couldn't afford to ship the lumber in for. Not saying that in some areas it wouldn't have been easier to wreck and rebuild, but when you're effecting an entire city it's better to make as many people happy as possible.
@@steeljawX Actually, Chicago was the hub of the lumber industry in the Midwest. All of the lumber camps in Wisconsin and the Upper Peninsula of Michigan (where my great-great-great grandfather was a logger) shipped their harvest to Chicago, where they were stored along the river for shipment via the I&M Canal and railroads to new towns further west on the prairie where there were no trees. When the fire happened in 1871, those lumber yards were how the fire hopped the river to the North Side.
He did say at the start that the property owners financed a great deal of the costs here so - I would imagine that those lesser quality buildings were still paid for...just differently. And I'm betting that no few of the owners of same were indeed told to sod off, if they objected to being moved!
I imagine that instead of lifting their homes they sold their property for hefty sums of money which they then used to roll their house away to the suburbs
🇬🇧Absolutely fascinating, especially as we live in UK. The marvellous Victorian builders. We know about our London history and that it has more rivers and canals than Venice. But to see the ‘Raising of Chicago’ was almost unbelievable for such large buildings & to carry on their trading whilst being moved! An excellent History lesson, thank you.🇬🇧
You should do a video about the raising (and reconstruction) of Galveston, TX (by 17 feet) and the construction of the seawall after the Great Storm of 1900. That's definitely a Megaproject.
If you take into consideration that the Civil War was about to and did break out around this time, then, yeah, raising Chicago is a "side" project. ;-}
I was suprised Simon didn't even mention the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 and the epic rebuild.. Much of these freshly raised buildings burned as 17,500 buildings were lost in the 1871 fire. The Burnham City plan for essentially the 2nd City of Chicago.. Needs to be in Mega Projects.
This one yes, but there are far too many simple planes(aircraft) on that channel....and the comments reflect that. A plane is RARELY mega....except in waste of taxpayer dollars.
Walk about in certain neighborhoods and one can still view the original ground level, where the entrance of the house is is on the second floor and the older entrance is below grade level. One can see this in historical homes in Wicker Park/ Bucktown.
Pretty straightforward actually. The lifters would slide wood beams under the first floor joists. The jack screws would sit under the beams (spacing dependent on capacity and building weight). Once you've supported the entire building, you just need to turn the screws simultaneously to lift it evenly. Simple if a building has a basement or crawl space. Concrete slabs didn't exist in the 19th century. Home lifters/movers still often use jackscrews or hydraulic jacks today. If you are lifting more than the adjustment range of a jack screw you would use "cribbing" to support the building while changing out jack screws. Hydraulics can lift a bit faster than jack screws, however they are considered more dangerous since the internal seals could fail. Also while lifting it's important to place support blocks under the jack screws to keep them from sinking into the soil below.
I grew up in Chicago; this was known as pretty much a side job, hardly a Megaproject. We also had to reverse the flow of the Chicago River. I'm pretty sure it's the only river that gets fed by a lake. As far as drainage, the Deep Tunnel project of the 1980s was kinda impressive.
It is clearly a sideproject: no one died from the process of lifting the city; there were not enormous cost overruns; no airplanes were involved; and, life went on like normal.
Thanks. I lived there for 35 years and hadn't heard this story. Two others related to drainage and Chicago, the Deep Tunnel project and the flooding of the Loop, both in the late 20th century.
I have seen 100s of your videos. Thank you for hosting and for your writing n editing crew ❤ But this was hands down the first video I've seen of yours that make my eyes almost fall out of my skull in bafflement. Manually jackscrew hydrolically lifted buildings in the 1800s? That's freaking badarse!
That deep feeling you get when its new years eve and its 3am and your walking down a dark alley by yourself while its snowing.... powerful feelings.....powerful city...
Interestingly enough, Seattle had a similar problem with waves flooding the downtown every year. Their solution was, wait for someone to leave a candle unattended, causing the whole downtown to burn down, and then just build the new downtown 10 feet above the smoldering ruins of the old one. Quick and easy! No jacks required.
Chicago's a really unique American city. As a result of lifting up the downtown, there's all these tunnels from rail subways to the pedway -- a series of pedestrian tunnels between buildings. You can spend days underground getting everything from coffee to a marriage.
There are sections in the lawndale and Pilsen neighborhoods, where they never raised the homes or yards, So they actually still sit about 4-8 feet below the sidewalks. You can see chamber like rooms below the sidewalks, I believe the city has sealed most of them now, if not all.
I grew up at the south end of the city on the lake. Our main street, Ewing avenue/ Rt. 41 north of 100th street has quite a few buildings with lower floors that you accessed by stairway down from the front sidewalks.
You might want to do a video on the walking tunnels underneath the University of Chicago many of which have labs and offices in them. It’s really quite extensive. I wonder if they were expanded for The Manhattan Project?
How have I not heard about this!? Or all the other things I'm learning from this channel that I am binge watching now. I am so excited to find such a plethora new knowledge tidbits. Excellent!
So yeah downtown Chicago does have an under city and it’s a pretty amazing site for those who have seen it. If your in the undercity you can see where the tall buildings start and it makes you think if you fell through a grate on street level you would have a long way to fall
Definitely a megaproject but also similar to things that have been done other places like Seattle and Portland, Oregon. Admittedly not by jacking up the city, rather by making the ground floor the basement and moving up to make the 2nd floor the new ground floor, oh, and also moving the street up one story.
Good job Simon. I'm glad this finally found a home. I tried to pitch it to Today I Found Out but they didn't take it. I had thought about reaching out to Megaprojects, but the project seemed too repetitive in process. This seems right.
WOW!!! FLABBERGASTED!!! MIND BLOWN!!! INCREDIBLE!!! GOBSMACKED, I AM!!!! I thought the Boston Big Dig was a big deal!!!! Incredible!!! Again, another great story-journey into the past!!!! Keep up the great work!!!
Excellent. You could do another one on the cities extensive underworlds. All the below grade volume created by lifting everything up has lead to the entire thin being crisscrossed with rail, pedways, and tunnels,
This was followed by replacing 17,500 buildings, 120 miles of sidewalks and 73 miles of roads that were destroyed in the Chicago Fire in a short amount of time. It changed architecture, fireproofing buildings, and fire fighting tactics, and the city was able to host the World Columbian Exposition not long after. These were huge undertakings in a short period of time.
The man with the horse under him was John (Long John) Wentworth, former mayor of Chicago. He was a well liked fellow, and given his tall height, made this apocryphal story a perfect fit for him.
This was totally fascinating! I’ve never heard about this project before and I’m over 65! What a feat! I wonder if this could be accomplished again. There are parts of Florida that are gradually sinking. This would seem like something that state might look toward. Thanks, Simon, for another interesting video!
They moved the entire town of Hibbing, MN about 4 miles southeast to get access to one of the richest iron ore deposits in the world. Hull Rust Mahoning Mine. Mining company bought the town a new high school on top of it all. Home of Greyhound Bus Lines. Interesting side project
that "no thank you, i have a fine horse under me" line was used in the Jeremiah Johnson movie, the line was said by Stefan Giersach who played the character Del Gue in the movie
They raised the city for over two decades and then on the eve of October 8, 1871, the 'Great Chicago Fire' begins. Over the next 36 hours nearly 1/3 of the city, including the area that was raised, burns.
I'll be eating lunch downtown with people and, when I casually mention that downtown Chicago sits on jacks 40 feet above the ground, they give me a strange look as if the say "yeah, right!" 150 years later and people don't even realize it.
I live in downtown chicago and this is a cool video. If your in downtown chicgao and walking on michigan ave, on the wacker bridge llooking east towards the lake and the 'LOEWS" building, you can see the 3 levels of downtown and the middle level is where they shot the batman driving scenes
I surprised that other highly populated low lying areas haven't done this, considering its success in Chicago...I guess my only caveat to that is that many such locations, such as New Orleans or much of Florida are subject to frequent violent storms & raising the buildings might just create a whole new set of issues for them...
This is much more Mega then any of the last 4 megaprojects vids... Watching for Simon to pull a Blaze and make Side Projects about momentus projects and Megaprojects only about planes trains and boats :p
That was great. Some years ago I watched a doco on house movers. They could lift and move entire stone, brick or wood multi story buildings using a similar method of hydraulic jacks and trucks.
There are a few downtown Chicago streets at the original level, which make good locations for police chase scenes in films. Chicago's more recent Deep Tunnel project attempts to drain the area. It is a mega project. Even as large as the project is, it is not enough to prevent all flooding in the relatively flat region. I think the major problem for Chicago today is a deep taxes problem. Thousands of long time Chicago area residents are being taxed out of their homes, which is the primary reason that the state of Illinois is losing population. The tax spike is the result of decades of local government borrowing of a monumental scale, with seemingly almost no oversite by government officials. If not corrected, only the poor and the wealthy can afford to live in Chicago.
Definitely a Mega-project. have you done Boston's Back Bay? BTW Bosto also did this on a much smaller scale when the lifted much of Bay Village in the South Bay, although not all private land was raised.
Any project so big that *thousands* of people work at it for *20 years* ... that *is* a Mega-Project, without a doubt! How about when the Americans and Canadians 'turned off' Niagara Falls! I remember this vividly, as my family took a trip there from 'next door' - Rochester - to view Niagara Falls, but were disappointed; it wasn't considered that big a deal in Rochester, so it wasn't covered much and we'd forgotten about it. We got there and all there was to see was a cliff with a little bit of water trickling over it! My Mom and Stepfather were somewhat chagrined, and had to promise us kids that we would come back "after they've turned the Falls back on". To this day, I mention this to people and they they think I'm trying to 'pull a fast one' on them (especially if they've been there and experienced Niagara Falls)! But just search 'Niagara Falls turned off'!
In 1800, Chicago was just a couple of trading stores by the river, and a fort. By 1900, Chicago was the 4th largest city in the world. Exciting times it must have been.
Simon I think I am subscribed to all your channels you are basically the only think I watch on RU-vid anymore. This was an awesome video keep them coming. P.s. my favorite channel is Buisness blaze
I'd like to see a video on the 1997 'North Hollywood Shootout' ... how it changed police tactics and equipment in the aftermath, and the back story of the perpetrators. Enjoy your content greatly, cheers Simon!
up into the 60s there were still buildings a level down that had not been lifted and the new entrance was the 2nd floor. their big neon signs were placed on level 3 or the highest floor available. they also had to re route a river , drain marshland and make the river flow backwards the river..chicago i think... was foul with rotting meat product waste , human waste and horse poo . . it actually made big bubbles sometimes and ran red with blood from the stockyards. not trying to step on any toes - this is my city and i go deep into certain parts of it. history is huge for me and its just exciting that other people think of it too.....
There is only one question on this fascinating vid - did any buildings collapse during the jacking process? If not then this exercise deserves to be counted as one of the greatest urban projects of all time
I mentioned this in a tweet but maybe it'd work better on this channel. How about "The Big Ditch" aka the MS Mitch Mitchell Floodway in Wichita KS? It's part of the largest water diversion projects in the US.
