Back in the old Midway building, there was always a restaurant on the opposite street corner.
For much of that time, the restaurant was the famous Hot Doug’s, a gourmet hot dog restaurant that attracted lines around the block, and was documented in a book and a movie. But there were other restaurants in that spot before and after.
In my early years at Midway, it was Diane’s Place, a diner so pervasive with grease I felt sick any time I ate there. That so many of my coworkers swore by it always baffled me. I believe the reason the owner eventually gave up and sold the place was a car accident.
Chicago has always encouraged a risky kind of impatient driving style. Narrow streets, lack of turn lanes, on-street parking, and rampant double-parking make this problem worse. The intersection at California and Roscoe streets has a traffic light. The roads are wide enough for 2 lanes of traffic on either side, but street parking starts up mere feet from the intersection on both roads, which forces an immediate merge if anyone tries to use the “right lane”.
Someone was going South on California Ave and was waiting at the light to turn left. The light was green. Someone sailing down California decided he didn’t want to wait and pulled a common Chicago maneuver of swinging into the “right lane” to pass. He did so without slowing down and panicked when he discovered a pedestrian in the road he couldn’t see through the car stopped waiting to turn.
The driver swung hard to swerve around the pedestrian and lost control of his vehicle, smashing full-force into the door to Diane’s Place. The all brick facade crashed around him. Fortunately, this happened late enough in the evening that no one was in the restaurant to get hurt. That’s how the restaurant got its nickname: Diane’s Drive-thru.
The insurance company paid to restore the entrance, but instead of the right angled corner it had been, a new entrance was built at a 45 degree slant. And it is still that way today.