Creating an Inviting and Forward-Thinking LaSalle Street

We worked with the City of Chicago to create a new vision for downtown's LaSalle Street, stretching from the Riverwalk to Jackson.

A more neighborhood-oriented public realm along LaSalle Street’s sidewalks and plazas is a key element of the City of Chicago’s corridor revitalization goals. The visioning process will help: 

  • Ensure public spaces are conducive to the area’s transition from a monoculture of offices to a dynamic, pedestrian-oriented, mixed-used environment. 
  • Identify public realm improvements and programming opportunities to stitch together significant civic and cultural assets, such as City Hall and the Riverwalk.  
  • Identify opportunities for improved sidewalk amenities, enhanced lighting, new landscaping, public art, and other amenities consistent with mixed-use neighborhoods. 
  • Propose lighting solutions and ways to integrate technology to make LaSalle a Smart Street.  
  • Identify opportunities for short-term and long-term placemaking activations. 
  • Envision ways to help connect the public realm to the grand lobbies and halls within historic corridor buildings.  

To set a clear direction for transforming LaSalle’s public realm between the Riverwalk and Jackson Boulevard, the City of Chicago’s Departments of Planning and Development (DPD) and Transportation (CDOT) collaborated with an expert consulting team led by MurrayTwohig that included All Together, Blue Daring, KOO, Hugh Lighting Design and AECOM. 

One of the Place Principles which emerged from our visioning work. (Illustration by Blue Daring)

In January 2025, the City released the outcome of this work. A Vision for LaSalle Street is a community-led framework for public realm improvements and neighborhood-oriented enhancements between Wacker Drive and Jackson Boulevard.

The vision is built around 11 planning principles, which include:

  • Promoting a mix of private uses that encourage vibrancy outside of traditional 9-to-5 business hours, such as new restaurants and stores.
  • “Softening” the street’s canyon-like environment with new landscaping and greenery.
  • Making art, architecture and performance spaces foundational parts of the corridor’s identity.
  • Creating welcoming, pedestrian-oriented community gathering spaces and convenient public transit connections.
  • Prioritizing diverse, affordable programming that makes LaSalle an equitable and accessible destination for visitors and Chicagoans citywide.

The document was informed by hundreds of community members through in-person and online meetings, an electronic survey and outreach through the 34th and 42nd ward offices.

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Images from the City of Chicago.

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