Paper prepared 6/96
Please send questions or comments to Elise Martel <U16982@uicvm.uic.edu>, graduate student in the Dept. Of Sociology at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
Provided by OPENAIR-MARKET NET
In the late summer of 1994, Maxwell Street, previously the longest running and largest openair market in the country, was dismantled by the City of Chicago and restructured as "El Nuevo Mercado de Calle Maxwell", or the "New Maxwell Street Market" about a half mile east of the original site. For more than 100 years, Maxwell Street served as a point of entry into the economy for poor, minority, and largely migrant and immigrant communities of Chicago. Sprawling for fourteen acres, the original Maxwell Street was a place of business and ethnic entrepreneurship for more than 800 vendors and their families sometimes comprising three generations as well as a place for the very poor to come and hock whatever could be found and sold. Every Sunday vendors would set up their wares on rented plyboard tables, car hoods, food carts, and the ground and display kitchen and household goods, trinkets, food and produce items, tires, clothing, religious goods, and even large furniture and appliances to crowds of more than 20,000. Maxwell Street has also long been recognized as an incubator for the Chicago style of Blues, and many a musician like Muddy Waters have traveled north to walk its street. While one can still smell the tamales and roasted meats, and hear the Blues and Latin beats at the New Market, many changes have occurred which have consequences for vendors.
Maxwell Street was not only a historical landmark, but also a local economic institution. But in the eyes of many, Maxwell Street has been not so much a haven for economic activity, but rather of illicit transactions, filth, stolen goods, and perhaps most of all, a nuisance and eyesore to proponents of gentrification on the Near West Side. So finally in a deal worth about 4.25 million dollars, the City sold the land that for over a century sustained a vibrant economic and cultural community to the University of Illinois at Chicago, the institution directly to the north.
For many years prior to the move, vendors practiced self administration in that they regulated space allocation themselves. Today, a potential vendor may go to the New Maxwell Street Market Office and pick up information which explains how to become a vendor, where to apply for a license, how to obtain a State of Illinois tax number, and how to purchase a permit for vending space. Bright flags in blue, red, and yellow, portable toilets, garbage cans, and security guards sporting green florescent jackets and walkie talkies dot the New Market site which comprises about eight city blocks. The sprawl is gone and a linear structure replaces it. Gone too are the low vendors' fees and around 400 vendors. Less than half the size and a drastic increase in fees and bureaucracy, many vendors have not made the transition to the New Market.
I have just completed my M.A. thesis on the New Maxwell Street Market, primarily looking at the rationalization and legitimation of the New Maxwell Street Market, and how in order to appeal to more affluent populations of the city, Maxwell Street has been tamed, themed, and turned into a special event of sorts. The consequences for vendors are also discussed. My method of choice has been informal and formal interviews with vendors and other key actors, as well as participant observation. I have a vending licence and vended at the New Market the summer of 1995. I will resume vending in June of 1996.
I have also interviewed merchants near the Old Maxwell Street Market to see if the closing of Maxwell Street has affected their businesses. The short answer is a resounding yes. Preliminary results show that most merchants experienced a decrease in sales, and 44% reported a decrease in sales of more that 50%. Over the summer I will interview merchants near the New Market site to find out how the New Market is affecting their businesses. The larger question I want to address here is whether informal economic activity detracts from or adds to local formal economy.
This summer I will working with others who have purchased space on a permanent basis at the New Market so that homeless vendors can come to vend without having to pay the fee and negotiate the bureaucracy.
My doctoral work will also be in this area, though what exactly I am not sure. I welcome any correspondence with students and others!!!
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