All but one reader guessed this cornerspot correctly: Ida B. Wells Homes, the CHA and PWA public housing project that, until recently, filled the space between 37th and 39th and King Drive and Cottage Grove with various specimens of run-down housing. Row homes, mid-rises, and high-rises were all part of the project, thrown up between 1939 and 1941. Ida B. was the largest pre-WWII public housing complex in the city, with 1,662 units. And overtly racist housing policies ensured mostly blacks would be warehoused within (where else does one go when poor and when your old neighborhood is bulldozed?). Admitting the failure of this public housing and most other examples around town, the CHA tore the whole thing down piece by piece. Oakwood Shores is the mixed-income development that's growing to fill the 94-acre void, albeit rather slowly. A new construction phase, with 106 units is currently underway. Yesterday's teaser post attracted the expected racially-tinged public housing backlash, but thankfully we have plenty of readers ready and willing to stuff such comments.
·Hint: Move-In Day at Famed Multi-Pronged Housing Project [Curbed Chicago]
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