(WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Senator Dick Durbin said four downtown buildings need to be torn down in order to ensure security around the Dirksen Federal Building.
Durbin wrote an op-ed in the Chicago Sun-Times in response to a column by architecture critic Lee Bey calling for the four buildings to be saved or risk creating a dead-zone on State Street.
Durbin wrote the reason the federal government purchased the now-vacant buildings is because of the security risk they pose to judges and others who work in the nearby Dirksen Federal Building. It’s to create a security buffer zone.
"These buildings have been vacant and unused for years, and have fallen into serious disrepair," he wrote.
"In 2015, a block of State Street was shut down because bricks were falling from one of the buildings onto the sidewalk below. The buildings have deteriorated even further since then."
In 2004, a person was charged and eventually convicted of attempting to destroy the courthouse with a truck bomb.
Related
