Ida B. Wells Drive
street in Chicago, Illinois, United States
Ida B. Wells Drive (formerly Congress Parkway) is a major east–west street in downtown Chicago, Illinois, in the United States. It runs east from the Jane Byrne Interchange, where it meets Interstate 90 (I-90), I-94 and I-290. At Wells Street, Ida B. Wells Drive continues as a surface street past State Street and Michigan Avenue, until ending at Columbus Drive in Grant Park in front of the Buckingham Fountain. In 2018, the street was renamed by the city government to honor the journalist and civil rights activist Ida B. Wells.
Route description
Ida B. Wells Drive begins at the Jane Byrne Interchange, where it intersects the Kennedy, Dan Ryan and Eisenhower expressways. After passing through the interchange, the Drive passes under the Old Chicago Main Post Office, then over the South Branch of the Chicago River. At an interchange with Franklin Street and Wacker Drive, Ida B. Wells Drive changes from a freeway to a surface street. It then crosses north–south streets in downtown, including Wells Street (thus creating an intersection of Wells and Wells), LaSalle Street, Clark Street, State Street and Michigan Avenue. At Michigan Avenue, Ida B. Wells Drive enters Grant Park, where it ends at Columbus Drive, just west of Buckingham Fountain.
West of the Jane Byrne Interchange, Congress Parkway still exists in several disjointed segments, serving as a frontage road for parts of the Eisenhower Expressway, and as a minor street through several West Side neighborhoods.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Ida B. Wells Drive” is street in Chicago, Illinois, United States. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Wells, Drive and street, not as a finished interpretation.
Why this record matters
The phrase “street in Chicago, Illinois, United States” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 30, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q5160813. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 2018.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Ida B. Wells Drive”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Ida B. Wells Drive primary sources, Ida B. Wells Drive archive and Wells research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Ida B. Wells Drive”?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Ida B. Wells Drive” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.