The Parking Lot
A key component to the MYAC entertainment venue is a large scale surface parking lot. To meet the venue's 750 person seating capacity, the MYAC is required to build a new parking lot that will have a minimum capacity of 242 cars. The MYAC knows 242 spaces is a huge lot. They also know it's not realistically big enough to meet their venue's capacity so they want to utilize the Fort Sheridan Metra parking lot for overflow parking.
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It's hard to appreciate the size of a parking lot without seeing it. It's especially difficult when looking at a drawing that doesn't show all the spaces. To help understand the size and scale of the MYAC parking lot, below is the Google Maps satellite view of the Target Highland Park parking lot. The actual Target lot holds ~305 cars but I cropped out the spaces that line the periphery of the lot. The image below shows a parking lot with 250 spaces.
Today, Fort Sheridan doesn't have any large, surface parking lots. This was not an accident. The developers intended it to be a residential neighborhood without commercial development, preserving the history and beauty of an architecturally and environmentally unique military base.
Target Highland Park Parking Lot
Photo from Google Maps Satellite View
Imagine the Impact
Can you imagine a parking lot of this size emptying onto Sheridan Rd a few nights a week?
Can you Imagine the lines of cars up and down Sheridan and Old Elm before and after events?
Can you imagine the overflow parking filling up the Fort Sheridan Metra lot and the buses going back and forth on Sheridan, Simonds Way and Lyster?
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Can you imagine people not wanting to park in the Metra lot and hunting for parking spaces on Lyster, Holabird, Whistler and Pralls?
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Can you imagine the noise, pollution, traffic and headaches of dealing with hundreds, if not thousands, of cars in our neighborhood every week.
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Fort Sheridan was purposely designed to not include commercial businesses. Can you imagine the impact on our neighborhood and its surrounding natural preserves if the MYAC is allowed to change the zoning and build their venue?