The Roseland Theater and the future of the neighborhood

11331 S. Michigan Avenue

For the past month I've went to the Pullman neighborhood to document the sights of the neighborhood. And I've allowed myself the opportunity to document the nearby communities as well. Most of what you see documented is photographed on my cameraphone often utilizing an olloclip lens.

So last week I took a quick stroll one late afternoon in Roseland and stopped in front of the Roseland Theater Building. This old building appears to be going through some remodeling and changing tenants in the storefronts as they appear to be vacant currently.

This former neighborhood movie house is looking for new use having long since stopped showing movies. According to Cinema Treasures - link above - it is being converted into retail use. Though this news hasn't changed for years so perhaps a number of things happened and I don't see a lot of progress.

However, I have one potential idea and it would involve doing something similar to what was done with the Logan Theater. It was rehabbed in 2011 and is a second run movie house and is a story you can read here - unfortunately that story is behind a paywall in spite of being published in 2012. Perhaps when the time is right that story of a deep pocketed developer who comes in to redevelop this building could happen here at the Roseland Theater.

In the meanwhile as I document Pullman as it is in 2016 a year after it was designated a national monument and other development activities there my hope is that this spreads across Cottage Grove. Roseland and the business district that sits on Michigan Ave from between 103rd & 115th Street can see some of the effects of being so close to a very successful tourist destination.

And furthermore I hope that in the near future we can see further progress on bringing the red line from 95th through Roseland. Thus the Roseland can certainly have a future similar to the Logan Theater which also isn't that far from a CTA L station.

ALSO you can see some of the photos of Pullman and Roseland over at The Sixth Ward's ig account. Here's the post below of the Roseland Theater.

The former Roseland Theater building. Waiting for a new use. #roseland #movietheater #architecture #chicagogram #southside #olloclip

A photo posted by The Sixth Ward (@thesixthward) on May 18, 2016 at 6:09am PDT