(Update: Fixed the image links)

Chicago is very different when you don’t drive a car. There is no subway in Chicago, just the “El” train – the Elevated train running throughout central Chicago. Its metal and concrete tracks run over the city, especially the central Loop, making the streets both distinctive and very, very loud. But when you ride the train you don’t notice all that. All you notice is the rooftops. A 10 minute ride will get you old brick buildings covered in creepers, small back-yard cafes and all sorts of rooftop advertisements, some new-fangled signs but many old-style banners painted on the old red-brick houses. It’s this rooftop Chicago – the noise of the train in the night, the half-faded advertisements on smoke-blackened buildings and occasional flashing lights from below – this is the city you can hear in the rumble of the trains in the back of Tom Waits songs.