Remember last week’s post on the Chicago suburb of Berwyn, Illinois, that was planning to tear down this amazing piece of parking lot art, to replace it with yet another Walgreens? I’m pleased to report that the movement to Save the Spindle is underway!

The site, savethespindle.com, is just getting started, but they promise to fight the removal of the car-ka-bob and prevent its replacement with yet another Walgreens drug store. More power to ‘em!

What’s in the cards for the Spindle-Savers? A petition drive to stop the demolition? An effort to move the sculpture to another location? A Walgreens boycott in favor of CVS? Non-stop “Wayne’s World” screenings? Tune in to find out…

As a longtime aficionado of roadside kitsch and a longtime (and now former) resident of Chicago, it is with great sadness that I read that the Spindle, a sculpture consisting of cars stacked on top of each other like a shish-ka-bob, will be torn down, to be replaced by a Walgreens.

A Walgreens? Anyone who’s been to Chicago knows that you can’t spit without hitting a Walgreens. They make Starbucks seem scarce and far-between… and that’s an accomplishment.

The 1989 sculpture was perhaps most prominently featured in the movie “Wayne’s World.” It’s in a shopping center at the corner of Cermak Road and Harlem Ave. in the suburb of Berwyn, if you’re keeping score or want to pay your final respects. It’s a shopping center that incidentally is chock full of late 1980s art. It’s an odd place in its own right. But the Spindle really makes the mall special. (As special as a strip mall can ever be.)

The fact that the sculpture, which features at least three models of car that my family owned at one point or another, will be removed, and likely destroyed, is bad enough. That it will be replaced with a Walgreens is unconscionable.

Save the Berwyn Spindle!

(image: Matthew Kulcsar, via Google Earth)

I’m back from vacation, tanned, rested, and ready. Thanks to Tyler Colman, a.k.a. Dr. Vino, for minding the store in my absence, and for guest-posting earlier today. (And, as an aside, congrats to him for his James Beard Award nomination!)

I returned to Chicago just in time to catch a glimpse of the behemoth Airbus A380 at O’Hare. Airbus and Lufthansa have been taking it on tour. Sadly, I arrived at 4:30pm and was unable to get the interior tour, but I snapped a few exterior photos. They’re not the greatest pictures, but what the heck.

The photo above was taken from my seat onboard a comparatively wimpy little Boeing 737, right after landing. We taxied right past the mega-jet after touching down. I have to admit, it’s really impressive when you see the plane in person. There was a 747 nearby, and it looked small.

And yes, being a dork, I took the train to the long-term parking lot and back to the terminal to try to get another glimpse.

More photos after the jump. Click “more” to see them.

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A group of Chicago’s aldermen (the local name for city council members) is proposing a bill that would block airlines from landing at O’Hare or Midway airports if they fail to have a passengers’ bill of rights in place. Pass the popcorn.

As a resident of Chicago, I really have to snicker at this kind of story, with a simultaneous sense of city pride and shame. This is the city council that, when its members aren’t being indicted, hasn’t shied away from making headlines with laws banning foie gras and a minimum wage aimed only at big-box stores.

But sometimes this is how things actually get done. In a federalist system, it’s sometimes slow, difficult, or impossible to change the rules nationally, for better or worse. Sometimes, large states (or groups of states) take matters into their own hands.

Take California’s rules regarding vehicle emissions. To fight smog, the state’s regulators mandated tougher emissions rules for carmakers; the size of California’s market was large enough that automakers implemented California emissions nationally. David Vogel, in his book Trading Up(aff), calls this “the California effect” or the “race to the top.”

A similar example might be the Texas school board’s power over the writing of textbooks. Because Texas is one of the largest states, and has a board wielding great power over which texts can be used in classrooms, publishers edit their books for Texas’ standards. Because it’s too costly to have different editions in different states, Texas has a huge role in defining curricula nationally.

Alderman Ed Burke believes in the California effect and apparently thinks that Chicago has similar influence. “O’Hare is the busiest airport in the nation. No airline is going to not want to do business in the city of Chicago.” Indeed, it’s hard to imagine airlines pulling out of Chicago en masse if a PBOR were required. This could get interesting.

The Chicago proposal isn’t yet officially proposed, and it sounds like it’s really more of an idea they’re kicking around at this point, rather than a full-fledged bill. No word yet on what the minimum requirements for a bill of rights would need to be, or if international and domestic flights would be treated equally.

It’s certainly a bit of grandstanding. (There’s an election this coming Tuesday, after all.) And while the city owns the airports, can they legally block an airline for such a reason? And finally, if PBOR bills up for review in Congress actually move forward in committee, it might be moot. But it’s certain to make the airlines sweat.

Like I said: Pass the popcorn.

(Hat tip to Rob at the Airline Hub for the link!)

Passengers miss flight because a Northwest crew wanted donuts
Since when do pilots call the shots on the ground, too? A flight crew convinced a hotel shuttle bus driver to go for donuts instead of heading to the airport, causing other van riders to miss their flight. Full story via Chris Elliott.

Wisconsin Dells loses its Wonder Spot
Ah, the Dells… The klassic kitschy Chicagoland weekend getaway. It has now lost one of its treasures, the gravity-defying Wonder Spot. While Tommy Bartlett’s Thrill Show remains, the Wonder Spot will be missed.

My bag is happy to see you
A “vibrating bag” was discovered unattended at Chicago O’Hare. (It contained a sleep apnea machine, so wipe that smirk off your face!)

I came for the transportation, I stayed for the haircut
Virgin Atlantic hires more in-flight beauty therapists.

Love at first sting
Two separate flights, two separate incidents of scorpions stinging people on a plane. Flight one: Chicago to Burlington, Vermont. Flight two, Miami to Toronto. Forget Samuel L. Jackson. Bring me Klaus Meine!

Singapore Airlines’ new business class… reviewed!
Remember Singapore Airlines’ major upgrade to its business and first class cabins on selected routes? The Global Traveller has sat in the business class seat, and offers his review. Live vicariously.

Charlie Trotter and United Airlines reunited and it feels so good
This is where the cost savings from eliminating pretzels in coach must have gone. United Airlines is jazzing up the food in business and first class. They’re bringing back uber-chef Charlie Trotter, whom they ditched after 9/11. Bet you a bag of savory snack mix that it’ll still taste like airline food… (Thanks to Mark L.!)

Oasis coming to Oakland
Oasis, the Hong Kong based discount airline, famous for it’s $128 tickets to London, is coming to the United States. They’ll start flights from Hong Kong to Oakland in June, with 4x weekly service to start, moving up to daily service in August. No word yet on the fare.

Avoid the TSA by shipping yourself in a crate?
This isn’t living the first class life, but it’s first class by shipping container standards: The Travelbox, a crate designed for shipping a person. Bonus: It has its own running water supply.

Enterprise Rent-a-Car adds hybrid SUVs in California
Enterprise will rent you one of 160 Saturn VUE Green Line SUVs in the Bay Area, LA, or Sacramento. Yes, only California. What, no other parts of the country care about fuel consumption? Hybrids: good. Hybrid CARS, and not just SUVs, would be even better… It’s a start.

American Airlines spurns Expedia
If you’re looking for American Airlines’ international fares or premium cabin fares on Expedia, you’re out of luck. The airline is apparently having a little spat with the online agency, and yanked its fares from the site. We’ll see how long that lasts…

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Paging Fox Mulder! The truth is not just “out there,” but it’s at O’Hare.

A dozen United Airlines employees report witnessing a UFO at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport on November 7, 2006. A “mysterious elliptical-shaped craft sitting motionless over Concourse C of the United terminal” prompted radio calls to the tower, where controllers were unable to spot the object, neither visually nor on radar. Yet plenty of people on the ground — all employees of the airline — saw it.:

All the witnesses to the O’Hare event, who included at least several pilots, said they are certain based on the disc’s appearance and flight characteristics that it was not an airplane, helicopter, weather balloon or any other craft known to man.
[...]
The pilots of the United plane being directed back from Gate C17 also were notified by United personnel of the sighting, and one of the pilots reportedly opened a windscreen in the cockpit to get a better view of the object estimated to be hovering 1,500 feet above the ground.

The object was seen to suddenly accelerate straight up through the solid overcast skies, which the FAA reported had 1,900-foot cloud ceilings at the time.

Good stuff. And no, it’s not a weather balloon, that’s already been ruled out.

Making it even tastier for the conspiracy buffs, there’s even a coverup!:

Some [airline employees] said they were interviewed by United officials and instructed to write reports and draw pictures of what they observed, and that they were advised by United officials to refrain from speaking about what they saw.

Like United, the FAA originally told the Tribune that it had no information on the alleged UFO sighting. But the federal agency quickly reversed its position after the newspaper filed a Freedom of Information Act request.

Go read the whole thing.

Now THAT’S the way to start off the New Year. Thanks to the Tribune’s Jon Hilkevitch for making my day.