Will the Bears ever get a new stadium?
I wonder.
Not just another building. I mean a magnificent arena that is large and comfortable and beyond modern, that has all the bells and whistles and delights that elite thought and design can bring. Build a stadium that will be the envy of the NFL, of the entire global sporting world.
It could happen.
Why hasn’t it?
Does our city have to burn to the ground, as it did in 1871, to get the Bears to think new architecture?
I remember sitting with then-Bears president Michael McCaskey in his office at old Halas Hall in Lake Forest, him spreading a large, rolled-up architect’s drawing over his desk, proudly showing off the design for the Bears’ new stadium to be built somewhere. South Chicago, I think. The lakefront. Maybe a suburb.
No matter. Of course, the thing never got built. This was 30 or so years ago.
Back then, as I recall, Mayor Richard M. Daley didn’t like Michael. There was some kind of problem. There’s always a problem.
And the problems usually are created by the Bears themselves. They want to build on the lakefront. They want to build where there’s no parking. They want to build so everybody in downtown Chicago has to look at their structure.
They want to build here, there, everywhere.
They want, they want.
The biggest wanter now is Bears president and CEO Kevin Warren. He seems to want whatever he can’t have.
And yet, the answer is staring him in the face like a lit-up billboard:
Arlington Heights.
The site of the old Arlington International Racecourse. It’s there — 326 blank-slate acres of pure football-shrine possibilities. The Bears own the land. The tax deals have been worked out. The place is so rare in its potential that your jaw drops.
The Bears already said they’re taking over. Even had a news conference about it. Then Warren came in.
So the Bears hesitate and backpedal and scratch their heads because, well, that’s what they do. Warren himself said in 2024, “Every year that we wait, it’s $150 [million] to $250 million of increased costs.” Great. Let the numbers roll.
If dithering is an art form, the Bears are the Picassos of it. They want to build on the lakefront because Warren thinks that’s where they need to be. They don’t. People will come wherever they build. Do it where the canvas is spread wide and bright.
The Bears don’t need to be smack dab in the middle of Chicago. The 49ers play in Santa Clara, California, 40 miles from San Francisco. The Dolphins play in Miami Gardens. The Bills play in Orchard Park, New York. The Giants and Jets play in New Jersey.
The Bears will be the Chicago Bears even if they play in Nebraska.
Why are they always stragglers — end-of-the-line, dumb second cousins who seem to enjoy their shack with the outdoor plumbing?
We already have the ridiculous Soldier Field redo, a contraption that shames our city’s architecture and despoils our lake view with its Flying Toilet Seat design. That was the Bears’ solution back in 2003. Do something new, Bears. Please.
Arlington Heights.
Go.
Grab shovels and fling dirt. Dig.
Listen, I remember old times. I remember smoking sections on airplanes. (Me: “I don’t like smoke.” Flight attendant: “No problem, sir, the smoking section ends a row in front of you.”) I remember being a kid and watching the Bears with my dad at Wrigley Field. I remember a crazy little Cowboys wide receiver named Tommy McDonald who didn’t wear a facemask.
I remember watching Bronko Nagurski get out of a limo at the Super Bowl in Tampa in 1984 and marveling at how much the historic Bear had shrunk but how huge his hands still were. I remember when facial-recognition cameras and door-surveillance cameras would have put rational citizens over the edge. I remember when you didn’t take your shoes off to board a plane. I remember when there were no seatbelts in cars, when college athletes couldn’t take a penny, when smoking marijuana was a crime.
I’ve been to stadiums in Athens, Paris, Sydney, Tokyo, Rome — all of which put the Bears’ past stadiums and current Soldier Field to shame. Times change. Roll a joint. Buckle up.
Go to Arlington Heights, Bears.
Be pioneers. Be splendid.
Build.