The Chicago "El" really is as cool as people say it is.

One reason it is cool is because it is old. We have elevated tracks in Atlanta, too, but they are modern concrete structures. The El is made of steel. Rusty old steel, too, in some places. The platforms and the steep stairs that lead up to them are wooden. The exits have those kind of turnstyles with lots of rotating metal bars that mesh together. I'm not going to waste your time or mine by trying to take pictures of this stuff with my dinky 320x200 camera phone. Go find yourself some decent railfan sites about the El.

I really need to come back here sometime when I have more time to explore.

And speaking of railfans, are there people who are "fans" of the financial industry in the same sense as railfans and roadgeeks? If there are, then downtown Chicago would be one of their main haunts. You can't walk a block without passing the offices of some major bank, stock broker, or something like that.

Chicago seems to have a neat solution to the problem of renaming major streets. Below the normal green street signs with the real street names, you see brown "honorary" signs.