Chicago Tour Guide Will Spend A Week In The Underground Pedway This Winter

By Tankboy in Arts & Entertainment on Dec 21, 2016 3:46PM

Margaret Hicks (right) proudly extolling the virtues of the Chicago Pedway.

We joke that Chicago winters make us want to burrow underground and not resurface until Spring, but one woman is trying to prove that could just be possible. Chicago Elevated's Margaret Hicks told us, "I'm just seeing if when I call the Pedway our 78th neighborhood, I really mean that. I want to see if it can sustain me. I might go crazy down there though too, so that's an option! "

On Jan. 8, Hicks will kick off "The Pedway Project" and attempt to spend a full week living underground in the confines of the Chicago Pedway. Hicks founded Chicago Elevated to give guided tours of the city she loves, and her Pedway Tour is one of the most popular she offers. And we can see why.

The Chicago Pedway is one of the true wonders of the city. Every resident can probably vividly remember the first time they discovered they could get around much of the downtown area without ever having to brave the cold—it's once of Chicago's buried treasures. And there is quite an underground network of shops and facilities dotting the series of subterranean tunnels. But is there enough to truly sustain life for an extended period of time?

Hicks, with one caveat—while she will eat and breath the Pedway she will be spending her nights sleeping at the Fairmont Hotel, but never venture outdoors—will endeavor to prove it is indeed possible. She spoke with us about the details:

CHICAGOIST: So, what drove you to imitate a mole-person and dive underground for a whole week?

MARGARET HICKS: In the past six years that I've been giving the Pedway tours, I have spent massive amounts of time in it. On the cold days, I can spend 6 or 7 hours in the Pedway. Between giving a tour and then getting lunch and maybe a trip to Fields or the Cultural Center to work for a few hours, I was spending good chunks of my day down there, and having really nice days! I wondered if I could spend a night in it, then decided to think bigger—why not try to live in it? I hooked up with the Fairmont, we had a nice relationship already, they were on board, so BAM! Here we are.

C: How are the logistics going to work? Isn't much of the Pedway closed at night?

MARGARET HICKS: The logistics, yes. I have concerns. I figure I'll have to be back at the Fairmont by about 7 p.m. each night. Sundays I'll be a bit limited too, a bunch of it shuts down. But this is also partly what I'll be doing down there, getting intimate with it. So I'll be carefully judging when each building closes and opens. My biggest concern is that sometimes, some buildings just shut their Pedway, this worries me! But I think it'll be okay and you know, I'm an improviser, I can always figure it out. I do think I'm going to be very careful in the first few days so I don't get stuck.

"Yes, Im really going to live down here for a week!"

C: You're going to have a lot of time to kill, how are you going to fill it?

MARGARET HICKS: I will have time to kill and doesn't that sound lovely? So, I can keep working, which is awesome, I can still give Pedway Tours. LA Fitness is my gym, so I'll swim and go to the gym. I think the movie theater in Block 37 is going to be a great friend to me. I have business meetings scheduled and social engagements already planned, lunches and things. And I'll spend quite awhile exploring nooks and crannies I may have been too rushed to notice before.

C: What are two or three of your favorite "secrets" of the pedway that will prove useful during your week underground?

MARGARET HICKS: My secrets! The gym and the pool, the LA Fitness under Randolph is going to be a good friend. The Cultural Center will be a great place to go work and see friends or have a meeting. Also under Millennium Station is still considered Pedway, it's covered, but there's some fresh air there! My favorite place to hang out and watch the world go by is the Pedway between the East and West towers of the Hyatt Regency, I'm sure you'll be able to find me there.

C: Do you already know the Pedway backwards and forwards or do you expect to make any new discoveries during your experiment?

MARGARET HICKS: I'm confident in my knowledge of the Pedway, but I also know that I am constantly surprised by it. I see new things there all the time, just today there was a guy burning incense down there under Fields, it was so nice, never seen him before. I'm not sure there are any parts of it I haven't seen yet, but that's not to say there aren't new things to be discovered. I want to know it differently than I know it now, I want it to be like my backyard and I absolutely believe I'm going to discover parts or ideas that I hadn't considered or noticed before.

C: Anything we didn't talk about that you'd like to add?

MARGARET HICKS: A lot of people are asking about the homeless in the Pedway. This is a part of the Pedway, this is part of the neighborhood. I've spent over 7 years exploring the Pedway and I know most of the people that are in the Pedway and part of this is exploring those issues as well. I want to touch on all parts of the Pedway, the great and advantageous parts of it and the rough parts too. This project is about exploring the Pedway as a neighborhood, I plan to explore all parts of what the Pedway means to the city.