Guys, I’m not entirely sure I’ve ever properly introduced myself. My name is Lindsay Welbers and I’m a freelance writer living in Chicago’s Jefferson Park neighborhood. My husband and I moved up here in June 2019, after nine years living in the same apartment in Logan Square. We were attracted to the access this neighborhood had to public transit, I’m a 10-15 minute walk away from two Metra lines, the Blue Line, and a ton of CTA and Pace buses. Also, the forest preserves are up here and that’s as close as you can get to wilderness in the city of Chicago. White tailed deer screw up traffic about as often as the Metra does up here.
That’s what inspired me to write “Chicago Transit Hikes: A guide to getting out in nature without a car.” I was in a new place, and I wanted to know what natural spaces I could find. This book is a guide for anyone interested in getting out into nature, without the use of a car. All the hikes in this book are accessible from a train. I tried to make it as useful as possible for as many people as possible, so there should be something for everyone in this book. That includes families with little kids in strollers, people with mobility concerns, and people like myself who prefer a rugged and disconnected hike.
The differences in the natural landscapes of Logan Square and Jefferson Park are subtle but clear. I knew how to find nature when I lived in Logan Square, that was easy. I lived between Palmer Square, The 606 and Humboldt Boulevard, so the natural world felt in many ways fully integrated into the pace of my life. Those are all places I traveled through on my commute, and they’re major pedestrian thoroughfares. They are vibrant natural spaces full of people any day of the year.
Here in Jefferson Park, it’s a little different. In Jefferson Park the nature lives in people’s yards, trees and forest preserves. You have to step into the residential areas to find nature. There aren’t places like Humboldt Boulevard to stroll, or The 606 to easily bike. Instead nature is accessed from people’s backyards. The pace is slower and the natural landscape reflects that. Palmer Square is full of sculptures and the occasional guerilla swing set. Jefferson Park is full of gardens, lawns and most of the swing sets are behind fences. That said it is gorgeous up here. My home office overlooks my backyard and I probably saw a dozen different types of birds today alone. Also, I’m pretty sure there’s an opossum living in my backyard. So I feel #Blessed about that.
My very favorite way to really connect with nature is to backpack across what wilderness we were smart enough to keep that way, but I still live in the city. It’s where my friends are, it’s where I work, it’s where my husband works. I’ve lived my whole life in Illinois, and the entire time I’ve been exploring and trying to better understand our natural landscape. It helps to be able to walk in nature. There’s something about looking in 360 degrees and seeing nothing but oak trees and tallgrass prairies on all sides of you that acts as a salve for the too-connected world we live in. We all haven’t got the time, skills or desire that it takes to wander into the remote corners of the country, like I enjoy doing. There are a few campgrounds in this book, which make it pretty easy to immerse yourself in nature without having to travel too far. The rest of the hikes in this book are more like day hikes, so you can sleep in your own bed at night. Chicago sits at a place of unrivaled beauty in the Great Lakes region, my goal with this book was to show my neighbors how to see that beauty, using the transit system we already have.
“Chicago Transit Hikes: A guide to getting out in nature without a car” is available for pre-order now, and will be released through Belt Publishing in May 2020.