Why give shoppers this . . . . . . if they already have this?

A Tribune editorial in favor of a Wal-Mart on west 83rd Street. I might slow down on the Wal-Mart postings, but this is still a relevant issue since I understand that people are mostly against it and then of course there are people who are for it. As per usual comments are good, let me know what you think about Wal-Mart coming to the area...

Driving down the Dan Ryan one recent day we passed a Wal-Mart semi headed south on its way out of Chicago. It easily could have exited the expressway at 83rd Street, turned right and proceeded several blocks past the new Lowe's store and a Potbelly Sandwich Works in the Chatham Market to deliver goods to what by now should have been Wal-Mart's second Chicago store. But the semi stuck to the Ryan. And the lot at 83rd and Stewart on Chicago's South Side? It's a vast expanse of vacant land, empty and forlorn.

Contrast that with the bustling scene we encountered at Wal-Mart's first and only Chicago store, on West North Avenue east of Cicero Avenue. The parking lot was nearly full. Shoppers streamed in and out of the bright, airy store stocking up on clothes, food, toys, housewares. Some stopped at the in-house Uncle Remus Saucy Fried Chicken for a bite of lunch. We bought sunglasses.

This thriving Wal-Mart is on the site of what had been a virtually abandoned building. The store provides jobs for more than 440 employees—it's currently hiring more—at average wages for hourly workers of about $12 an hour. In the 18 months the store has been open (through February), it has collected nearly $7.3 million in sales taxes alone—$1.9 million for the city, $3.9 million for the state, $917,000 for the RTA and $583,000 for Cook County. And it's a convenient shopping mecca for Chicagoans.

You would think the City of Chicago would want more of all of this: More jobs. More sales and property tax revenues. More convenient shopping opportunities. You would think the city would want fewer vacant lots.

You would be wrong.

An unusual clause in the Chatham Market redevelopment plan gives the city the right of refusal to anyone proposing to build a store larger than 100,000 square feet. This month Chicago said no (again) to Wal-Mart's proposed 195,000 square foot Supercenter store for the 50-acre South Side site, which once housed the Ryerson Tull steel plant.

Why didn't the city say yes to such a needed development? Because that would have reignited Mayor Richard M. Daley's still-smoldering battle with organized labor over the controversial Big Box ordinance. The City Council—with labor's frenzied support—passed that ordinance requiring big-store retailers to pay workers higher wages and benefits in 2006. Mayor Daley vetoed it.