ELPC Thinks: How to Turn a Toxic Waste Dump into a Park

A Case Study for Progress

ELPC, Alliance of the Southeast, and Friends of the Parks give a behind-the-scenes look at how community power, legal strategy, and sustained advocacy stopped a proposed 25-foot-high vertical toxic waste dump on Chicago’s Southeast Side lakefront. This conversation explored how an alliance of neighborhood organizations, civic groups, and environmental attorneys came together to defeat a misguided plan that would have further endangered an environmental justice community and Lake Michigan’s shoreline. Now, that same site will be restored and transformed into a public park.