The scene

In Serhii Chrucky’s humble opinion, Chicago has the architectural memory of an Alzheimer’s patient. “It tends to demolish more than forget,” he says. That’s why, in late 2007, Chrucky and two others launched Forgotten Chicago—to document, in photos, writing and the intermittent walking tour, lesser-known (some might even say secret) aspects of the city. One of Chrucky’s obsessions is Chicago’s sole surviving municipal parking garage (pictured), one of eight erected by the city to handle automobile traffic in the post-war economic boom. The garage, located at the corner of Grand and St. Clair, seems like any other aging, unspectacular hunk of concrete. But to Chrucky, 25, a history and photography student at UIC, there’s always more than meets the eye. “I remember reading about it online. Someone said, ‘Thank God we don’t have to park in this garage.’ I thought, Gee, that’s unfair. It’s a modernist monument to the automobile. They should really see the renderings of it.”

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