Design Contest Aims To Light The Downtown Night

By Chuck Sudo in News on Jun 5, 2014 2:00PM

This rendering provided by the city shows an example of how downtown could be transformed by the "citywide lighting framework plan."

Imagine downtown Chicago decked out in colorful lights at night, tourists and locals gawking at the spectacle. It could become a reality as the Emanuel administration announced an international design competition for a “citywide lighting framework plan” that would have downtown transformed into a Midwestern version of Paris’ “La Ville Lumiere, the City of Light.”

The request for proposals from the city focuses on five areas of downtown: the riverwalk; bridges and spans; Lower Wacker Drive; the “L” system; and “iconic buildings.” The proposal also calls for some neighborhoods to be decked out in light. Emanuel and Choose Chicago, the city’s tourist office, originally announced the plan in January as another attempt to increase tourism.

"Chicago has a rich history of innovation, events, architecture, museums and, festivals yet these are not reflected in how the rest of the world views Chicago. A world class lighting installation has the potential to change this perception of visitors as well as elevate the daily experience of Chicago residents.”

While that certainly tugs at civic pride and heartstrings, the possibility of lighting up downtown in pretty colors doesn’t sit well with some and not simply because the renderings in the proposal could make Chicago seem more like a tackier version of Times Square than Paris.

Drew Carhart of the Illinois Coalition for Responsible Outdoor Lighting told the Sun-Times after the plan was originally announced:

“It’s somewhat ironic that the mayor wants to turn Chicago into the Paris of North America when the Paris of France has finally figured out that creating lots of extra light to dump into the night is both wasteful of money and energy and really bad for the environment.”

Emanuel is hoping to use the project as a way to attract 55 million annual tourists to Chicago by the year 2020. Proposals are due no later than July 7.