For the first time in decades, the public will be welcome inside the legendary Uptown Theatre. Visitors will enter though the main lobby and take a short guided tour of the auditorium.

Download the Uptown Theatre Open House Chicago brochure and learn more about why this significant theatre must be saved.

Commissioned by the City of Chicago in 2000, the Urban Land Institue planners interviewed over 100 local stakeholders and community leaders to establish a viable reuse plan for the theater. The resulting blueprint focused on three critical pillars. The ULI study framework treated the theater as the nucleus of a concentrated, highly walkable arts campus.

Some key highlights identified during the study:

• The Uptown Theatre is the crown jewel of the Uptown district. It is one of the most outstanding theaters in the United States.
• The challenging opportunities facing Uptown cannot be met with limited resources. A wide array of both private and public sector resources will need to be tapped. Assistance from all levels of government - local, state, and federal - will be needed to achieve the panel’s strategy outlined in the Uptown plan.

• Traditional TIF will be wholly insufficient. Most innovative methods are needed, as has been the case for certain other major Chicago developments – most notably , the Navy Pier and McCormick Place. In fact, one of the strong techniques used in both these examples needs to be considered for the Uptown Theatre, if not for the whole Uptown district. The Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority has the power and the expertise to provide the funds most needed in Uptown, and strong consideration should be given by the state of Illinois to extending the authority to include Uptown.

• Uptown needs a special provision for new and special TIF taxes. Since an ordinary TIF district will not generate sufficient funds to cover all of the needs of Uptown, the panel suggests new TIF taxes, including the allocation of taxes generated by parking, amusement, utilities, City College, state universities located in city of Chicago, local and state sales taxes, the board of education, the park district and any other tax generators to which connection to the Uptwon Theatre can be shown.