Glass half-full: collision response one to celebrate

Migration was safer this past fall.

Photo by Jakob Pfalz on Unsplash

As no less an authority than Del the Funky Homosapien once said, “Crises precipitate change.”

A deadly bird collision event took place in Chicago during a single night in October 2023. A Congressman, the Mayor, and an Alderman all issued statements when photos of dead birds outside the McCormick Place convention center went viral. It’s not often that bird-related news gets such a response from politicos. In fact, I’m not sure there is a precedent in these parts in the past decade.

As I’ve said before, of all the ways humanity has altered the environment, placing large buildings at the center of an ancient migratory flyway has to be one of the more pernicious ones. The birds streaming north and south utilize the shorelines of the Great Lakes as migratory corridors, in our case funneling along the western shore of Lake Michigan. That’s right where McCormick Place is located, just east of Lake Shore Drive and south of downtown.

When birds get to Chicago, they encounter large urban areas laden with obstacles. As much as popular migrant traps—the tiny green spaces amid the development—delight us, they are also a symptom of the broader problems we’ve caused with our sprawling cities. There just aren’t many places for the birds to land and refuel.

So when they arrive in the city, birds can’t perceive glass the way humans do. As the American Bird Conservancy states, they perceive glass reflections of vegetation, landscapes, or sky to be real. And McCormick Place sure has a lot of glass.

This fall, though, researchers found only 18 dead birds by McCormick Place. The awful event of October 2023 resulted in 960 deaths alone. This year’s outcome means more birds have headed farther south and will return to northern latitudes to breed this spring.

As the Chicago Tribune reported last week:

The initial results are in at Lakeside Center, following the application of bird-safe film to the building’s windows: Crash fatalities were down more than 90% this fall, according to [Dave] Willard, who has been monitoring the site regularly since 1982.

The bird-safe film, applied at a cost of $1.2 million this summer, marks Lakeside Center’s windows with tiny dots that help birds detect the glass and avoid it.

The film was installed after discussions with the Fish and Wildlife Service, the Field Museum and Chicago Bird Collision Monitors.

It’s a stunning success story, and one that should be celebrated and shared with downtown building managers across the city. And it’s positive publicity for a government entity that hasn’t always been known for good news.

As an architecture capital, Chicago can be a leader on these bird-safe measures. And the response to that deadly October day might just be the catalyst.