In the Shadow of the Ivory Tower by Davarian L. Baldwin

Author:Davarian L. Baldwin [Baldwin, Davarian L.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2021-03-30T00:00:00+00:00

Beginning in the 1990s and intensifying during the 2000s, cities and urban life became desirable again. In order to remain competitive, UChicago was forced to change the way it went about the business of urban renewal. In the 1950s and 1960s, the university’s urban renewal schemes of demolish and fortify left the area with little of the “urban lifestyle” that commercial developers now like to promote. Walking through Hyde Park today, you might still see T-shirts describing the university as “The Place Where Fun Comes to Die.”8

UChicago had taken its “nerd culture” notoriety as far as it could go. The campus neighborhood certainly contained the research laboratories, conference rooms, and computer stations to draw the highly sought-after creative class. But the school failed to possess the campus culture of wide sidewalks teeming with cafés, galleries, retail, and nightlife to keep the creatives and their families. UChicago had fallen far behind the national trend of turning urban neighborhoods into an expanded campus district in ways that could be profitable for both the university and the city.9

Even locally, schools across the city had outpaced UChicago with new urban renewal projects to develop their surrounding areas into campus communities. The Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT) opened its Rem Koolhaas-designed McCormick Tribune Campus Center and “State Street Village” dormitories in 2003. IIT carved out a secure zone of student housing, retail, and recreation right in the heart of the struggling Bronzeville neighborhood. On the near west side, the University of Illinois at Chicago leveraged public funds to clear sixty acres of land and create a fully planned campus town of residential and commercial properties to service the “ready-made population” of students. Many are concerned that this “South Campus” has raised property values beyond the means of the Latinx Pilsen neighborhood nearby.10

UChicago realized that it had to design an urban environment that could help stave off the steady stream of student and faculty dollars flowing away from campus, what retail specialists describe as “leakage.” And the upgrading of Harper Court was its first significant development project.11

The original Harper Court commercial district had been created in 1965 as a limited refuge for artists and small shops displaced by the university’s first urban renewal initiative in Hyde Park. Maybe it’s poetic irony that once commerce became a centerpiece of UChicago’s growth strategy, Harper Court took on new meaning. The summer it first opened, Harper Court celebrated with literal fireworks. It served as one of the four designated shopping centers after the university had demolished commercial areas under the Hyde Park–Kenwood Urban Renewal Plan.12

After several decades and little investment, the bungalow-style shops and public square grew dated and worn down. But Harper Court remained an important, racially diverse social space in Hyde Park. Residents continually recall the army of Black chess masters plying their craft in front of anyone who walked by while low-rent pizza shops, chicken shacks, and other affordable fare dotted the storefronts of the 53rd Street corridor.

Dominique James was a high school student and artist in Hyde Park during the years just before Harper Court’s grand reopening in 2013.

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