Garfield Boulevard, Washington Park, and existing means of interconnectivity all must remain desirable and functional spaces after the implementation of the Obama Presidential Center, bettered in fact, or the immense potential of this opportunity will be negated.  Attempting to improve a community, yet to disregard the area’s needs, trample its existing assets, or deliberately weaken its existing strengths, amounts to counterproductive nonsense.

Hence, great care has been taken to help integrate the Obama Presidential Center into the surrounding context with only beneficial impact to the immediate area.  It can be assured in this fashion that Chicagoans will look back on the Obama Presidential Center as a true achievement, a marker of advancement for the South Side, an accomplishment of pride and mutual respect – precisely the gift to Chicago for which President Obama should be remembered.

The continuity of the historic Chicago Boulevards system is maintained for bicycles and pedestrians at street level by means of a bold gateway beneath the Center’s library edifice.  For vehicular pleasure uses making use of the Boulevard System and the new Garfield Boulevard Tunnel, continuity is retained by providing a graceful exit within the park, allowing direct access to the Midway Plaisance, or a leisure route to either Drexel Boulevard or northbound Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Drive, via a grand loop along Russell Drive.  This means of Boulevard interaction is shown as a dotted light blue pathway in the diagram above.