>> Nightmarish a portal to disappointment.

The Bermuda Triangle of Chicago.

Lower Wacker Drive has a lot of haters and a lot of diehard fans who say the learning curve is worth zipping along underneath clogged downtown streets.

So how exactly did we end up with this divisive divided roadway which was officially opened 100 years ago today.

Nick Blumberg explains.

>> The streets of Chicago.

Sure the traffic can get rough, but with the exception of some pesky diagonal, that these that's a nice orderly grid and easy to navigate, except, of course, for lower Wacker Drive the pain of the uninitiated.

Chicago motorist it's There simply is no picnic, either.

Daniel Burnham of make no little plans.

Fame first envisioned and dual level roadway along the riverfront in his 19, 0, 9, city designed by Burnham's collaborator, Edward Bennett.

The idea was to create a double decker roadway aimed at relieving riverfront congestion.

It replaced the existing water street crowded hub for produce sellers and other wholesalers whose market would be looted over to the near West side.

The duplex design found a major champion in the chair of the Chicago Plan Commission.

That would be one Mister Charles Walker who help sell the plan as vital to the city's future.

Construction started in 1924.

And it was a massive feat.

Buildings along the river were demolished.

Hundreds of work next steam shovel excavators wreckers and lifters dug in and built a retaining walls to hold back the river.

New sewer lines carved out of the ground.

Tens of thousands of square yards of asphalt and granite block crews excavated so much dirt get cover a full city block and stood 75 feet high.

All told it racked up a bill of more than 20 million dollars.

Some 375 million bucks in today's money.

Ahead of that October 1926.

Opening the Chicago Tribune waxed Rhapsodic calling a sham in this city's front yard.

Sure, Chicago zone ovation Fields was extended a few times in the 20th century before getting a much-needed overhaul and modernization in the early 2, thousands and of course, being immortalized in film by a certain caped crusader in 2008 while some drivers bemoan the dark lower drive, others embrace it as a sort locals only short.

>> What are fear at the massive undertaking is still one of a kind and undoubtedly among the projects that shaped the downtown Chicago.

We know today.

>> Look at much a car when every time I go down there, I feel like I'm gonna get lost.