CityLab from the Atlantic: Drawing Attention to Chicago’s Anti-Homeless Measures With ‘Compartment 13’

Chicago has constructed sloped barriers beneath the Kedzie Underpass to force out Lazarus Alcazar and other homeless men and women. This comic tells his story.

By Darryl Holliday and Jamie Hibdon

Homeless people in Chicago face many of the same challenges as low- to no- income people around the world. But city officials took those troubles one step further by constructing steepled anti-homeless barricades this summer at a makeshift homeless encampment on Chicago’s Northwest Side. The following comic shows what happens when a group of men and women with nowhere else to go are told to move along.

Comic strip 1comic strip 2 comic strip 3 “Compartment 13” was produced in partnership by the Illustrated Press,Symbolia, and the Journalism Center for Children on Families.