Cry me a river and build me a bridge.

This bridge crosses the North Branch of the Chicago River north of Foster Ave, in Labagh Woods.  It was a train bridge until some years back when the route was discontinued.  Last year or so, the tracks were pulled up and plans to turn this abandoned right of way into a trail are supposedly in the works.  As of now, the path isn't really conducive to biking or jogging, since the large rocks are still there, unless it's intended to be an "extreme" trail.  Mostly, this area is frequented by people walking dogs.  And photographers.  And evidently, taggers.

For as long as I can remember, up until recently, this section of woods attracted the kind of ghoulish grime you never would see in everyday life.  My friends and I would ride our bikes on the nearby trails, and it wasn't unusual to see "odd" people out there.  We used to think they were Satanists.  Maybe they were homeless, maybe they were just rebellious teens.  Whatever the case, they used a lot of drugs and trashed the place.  We'd see needles and little baggies all over the ground.  Beer cans, beer bottles, all kinds of trash.  It was kind of like a mecca for crackheads and wayward hobos.  One evening, as a couple friends of mine and I were heading out of the woods after hitting the bike humps, we encountered a group of crazies coming in- and they all wore black trench coats and looked to be preparing for an animal sacrifice.  I was thankful to be leaving at that time!

Another regularity were the cars.  Just under this bridge, on any given day, there would be up to three cars, minivans, or Jeeps upside down in the river.  They had been completely charred and then bombed with graffiti.  The act itself wasn't what confused me, considering the usual clientele.  It was a question of how did they ever get the cars there?  It would have been impossible to drive them up the bridge to push them over at that spot.  The only possible way was if they pushed the cars down the embankment, but even that seems unlikely, seeing as how narrow and jagged the embankment is between the trees. 

And the bridge has always been artfully decorated, but these days it seems people are putting a lot more time and effort into the project.  Mostly, these are taggings and not gang graffiti.  I often wonder how someone could do this much work and not get noticed.