To discern this aspect of Mayor Daley's character does not require following him about town and indiscreetly spying at his fleeting ankles. Or one may think back to the administration's crusade against sidewalk newspaper stands. Richard M. Daley is, without question, one part municipal tidier. Just where Mayor Daley acquired his powerful appetite for the symmetrical building line, the neatly clipped lawn, and the antiseptic frivolity of Navy Pier is not readily evident. There is, however, one point of resemblance between Richard I's and Richard II's Chicago.
Big projects allow mayors to recreate the city's physical environment in their own image.
I believe both Mayor Daleys have been animated by this drive. Big projects also allow mayors to distribute contracts, thus rewarding major campaign supporters and indirectly underwriting the wages of countless constituents in the building trades. His bulging campaign war chest has also served to win the hearts and minds of city council members. Those alderpeople who are sufficiently compliant to the mayor's will can count on receiving a cut from his fundraising surplus. In short, big projects offer our Mayor Daley multiple political advantages.