Chi-Town Rising Is Not Certain To Return Next New Year's Eve

By Mae Rice in News on Jan 8, 2016 8:26PM

(Bekki Y. Wasmuth / Chicagoist)

Despite reports that Chi-Town Rising will be back to shut down roads downtown and draw sparse crowds next New Year's Eve, it may not be so.

“That was not verified information,” said Katheen O’Connell, who handles public relations for the event’s organizers, Arena Partners. “[W]e hope to have a more concrete announcement in the coming weeks.”

The organizers are definitely counting the inaugural Chi-Town Rising as a success, though, according to a statement from Arena Partners’ president John Murray:

We are ecstatic about the success of the inaugural Chi-Town Rising. The crowds that gathered all around the area to watch the fireworks and Rising Star were greater than we anticipated as was the viewership of the live broadcast on TV.

As for those numbers—the organizers generously estimate that 90,000 people attended.

That figure is “based on attendees at all Chi-Town Rising events (i.e. Family Countdown Celebration, Broadcast Boulevard, Corona Beach House), partner events (i.e. New Year’s Eve Soiree Ball, Resolution Gala, Howells & Hood), and all of the people that gathered in public areas throughout to watch the celebration, fireworks, and Rising Star ascend,” O’Connell said.

One sad but likely true thing: If Chi-Town Rising returns next New Year’s Eve, it will likely still have the same, tired name. The Tribune reports:

“People use [the term ‘Chi-Town’] who live in Chicago, that are in the neighborhoods, people in music and the arts," said John Murray, president of event producer Arena Partners. He said the aim of the name choice was to be hip, useful and authentic, adding that the moniker tested well with millennials and is widely used in products and advertising for companies such as Nike, Harley-Davidson and McDonald's.