Originally Posted by
destro713
•Whoever told me Elston was a nice route going south to downtown was wrong. Crappy pavement, every single intersection is a 6-way, and hills. There aren't supposed to be hills on a Chicago commute. There are hills on Elston.
•Heading east through downtown on Jackson sucks big time.
I think your ride home via Adams, Wells, Lincoln, Damen will be a lot better. Especially on Wells and Lincoln, it is not difficult to outpace cars. You don't even have to go 20mph to do that. It puts a big smile on my face everyday. The only hard part may be Adams. There are tons of CTA bus routes heading West on that street. Take a look at
http://www.cityofchicago.org/Transpo...ap/keymap.html for an on-line bike map. It may help you avoid Adams.
Since you are on Michigan, another suggestion is to head East to lake Michigan and then take the bikepath north all the way to Lawrence or thereabouts. It may add a mile to your commute, but this time of year it is not busy at all and quite relaxing.
It's my typical commute. Into downtown using the bikepath, going North using Wells, Lincoln, Southport, and Clark.
Have fun commuting in Chicago!
Duppie