Window air-conditioner on suburban 'endangered' list
Until the U.S. Department of the Interior placed polar bears on the Endangered Species protection list this week, I had forgotten all about that designation. Having spent an entire Earth Day as a kid cleaning out my hometown library's lily pond (now long gone), I remember President Richard Nixon signing that law in 1973.
"Nothing is more priceless and more worthy of preservation than the rich array of animal life with which our country has been blessed," Nixon said. Of course, that was before the days of $4-a-gallon gasoline.
Most suburbanites' only encounters with polar bears have been at the Lincoln Park Zoo, where the huge, white beasts use their impressive swimming pushes off the glass to awe crowds. It's difficult to think of them as endangered when we see polar bears all the time as pitchmen for Coca-Cola.
While cougars certainly are endangered in Chicago, Illinois' official list contains 26 additional animals -- from the "pallid sturgeon" to the "Fat Pocketbook Pearly Mussel," which surprisingly was not called to testify during the Rezko trial.
The top dog on our endangered species list might be the Illinois Cave Amphipod, which was granted federal protection in 1998. A small shrimp-looking thing, the species is troglobotic (which means it lives in caves) and generally hangs out near downstate Waterloo, where it has zero chance of being signed to a deal as a soft-drink advertising hawker.
Because animals on the endangered species list might not register with every suburbanite, we should make our own list of uniquely suburban creatures that are endangered.
This week, we could have added a species called "street-side, in-window air conditioners."
Addison's aesthetic awareness puts the oft-maligned window units on the list. According to a new village ordinance, any window air-conditioner that hangs out of a window should be extinct within two years, leaving Addison residents free to bask in the stunning beauty of air-conditioners that are flush with exterior walls.
Springtime Christmas decorations have been on the suburbs' endangered species list for years. Ordinances in Aurora, Mount Prospect, Elgin, La Grange and beyond require that outdoor displays go extinct (or at least hibernate in the attic) by spring.
Street parking is endangered. Suburbs from Gurnee to Carpentersville have bans that cut into this species. Even more endangered is a species known as the Giant RV Parking Space.
The suburban species known as the Parallel Parking Spot appears less frequently than coyotes but can still be found in most remote areas. (I suspect we're saving a few for future use as the last designated spots where people will be allowed to smoke.)
Ash and elm trees are endangered in the suburbs but still are doing better than Cock Robin restaurants. Those popular ice cream havens died out in the suburbs, except for one in captivity in Brookfield -- which also boasts polar bears.
Only two drive-in movie theaters remain in the suburbs -- one in McHenry and one in West Chicago. Sadly, there are no mating efforts to propagate the species.
However, the suburbs do have some endangered species success stories.
Outdoor grills at multi-family housing complexes were thought to be extinct in Naperville. Then, thanks to a ban-lifting in 2006, outdoor grills recovered and now are off the endangered list.
Front porches, nearly wiped out by backyard decks, also have made a comeback.
And so have bicycles, which leaped off the endangered list to make room for polar bears. No matter how much we like bikes or value bears, their fates may hinge on gas prices.
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In Thursday's column about WWII veterans, we failed to credit Pi Kappa Alpha International Headquarters for kindly providing us with two photographs of artist Paul Penczner. We're sorry about that.