It's New To Us: Chicago's Population In Handy Graphic Form

By Karl Klockars in Miscellaneous on Jan 10, 2011 8:20PM

Infographics! The kids love 'em! And so do we, obviously, since we brought you "Is It Food" earlier today and follow up with this "Man, Chicago Used To Be Bigger, Didn't It" population chart from the Museum of Contemporary Art. We stumbled across this last week and thought we'd bring it to you today - click through for the full sized version.

The graph pulls together the city's population with data points like major events, the progress of open space in the city, civic improvements like expressways and airports, major buildings such as the Inland Steel structure, and the parade of mayors. Our main point of interest? 1950 as the high point of pre-suburban-sprawl population, and then seeing how it crashes to the tune of hundreds of thousands of people fleeing the city over the next 40 years.