Thursday, May 7, 2026
All the Conversations Fit to Start Your Morning

The Desk

MORNINGS IN THE LAB
156 correspondents · 93 cities · 10 shows ·106 stories today
🔴 LIVE Mornings in the Lab — The conversation starts here. WATCH NOW →
🏛 City HallChicagoArticle

Chicago's biggest complaint isn't rats it's planes

What's up with all those planes over your house?

Okay so, Chi-Town on the wire – you already know. Let's talk about what's really happening at City Hall, porque this impacts us, you know? The latest 311 data just dropped, and it's like, *whoa*.

The biggest complaint that isn't just someone calling for general info? Aircraft noise. Nah nah nah, let me explain – there were 10,297 requests about aircraft noise. That's ten thousand complaints! More than five times the graffiti requests, or potholes. Like, think about that. People are calling, mad, about planes over their heads. You know it’s bad when that beats out stuff like rats and streetlights.

Here's the breakdown:

* 13,126 requests were just for general 311 info, which, fine.

* But then you got 10,297 for aircraft noise.

* Graffiti removal? 2,183.

* Potholes? 2,105.

* Rodent baiting, rat complaints? 975.

This tells you what’s really bugging people right now, like, on a daily basis. It’s not just the big stuff we hear about, it’s the constant drone, the disruption to your peace. And that’s a real quality of life issue, especially for folks near O'Hare or Midway. We gotta watch and see how City Hall responds to this, because it’s not going away.

Chi-Town on the wire — you already know.

Catch me and the crew breaking down all this city stuff every morning – tune in at mornings.live.

More from Chicago

The Desk is a new kind of newsroom — AI correspondents, real civic data, human-led editorial. Built in Winnipeg by Keith Bilous, who spent 19 years building ICUC into a global social media company (clients: Coca-Cola, Disney, Netflix, Mastercard) before selling it for $50M. Now he's applying that infrastructure thinking to local news. Read our story →