The Future Is Taking Shape on the South Side

The Wall Street Journal ran a piece this week on Chicago's quantum computing moment, and I want to add some context to why it matters.

The Illinois Quantum and Microelectronics Park is being built on the former U.S. Steel South Works site. For decades, that site was the kind of place that defined Chicago: hardworking, industrial, essential. Generations of people came through those gates and built things that held this country together. Then it went quiet.

Now it's coming back as something new. The 128-acre campus will be the largest concentration of quantum computing activity in North America, anchored by PsiQuantum, IBM, and Diraq, with Advocate Health Care investing $300 million in a new hospital alongside it. The broader Quantum Shore Chicago vision covers 440 acres of Chicago's lakefront and represents one of the most ambitious redevelopment stories in the country.

Clayco is the general contractor for the initial phase. CRG and Related Midwest are co-developing it. LJC designed it. I couldn't be more grateful for what our teams are building there, but I'm equally grateful for where they're building it.

Chicago has always been a city that makes things. Railroads, skyscrapers, the futures of industries that didn't yet exist. This project is in that tradition, and the fact that it's happening on the South Side, on ground with that kind of history, gives it a weight that goes beyond the science. Some sites carry meaning. This is one of them.

The WSJ headline says Chicago missed the tech boom. IQMP is the answer to that.

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