Apple recently spent nearly $4 million to restore North/Clybourn, a run-down subway station near its newest store in downtown Chicago. The Chicago Tribune said the station used to be so crappy riders would get off one stop earlier or later to avoid it. Now, climbing the stairs out of the station, potential buyers of iPods and iPads get out only to see a "giant, glowing box of glass, stone and polished steel": the new Peter Bohlin-designed Apple store.

The new station features "new brick, big new windows, and a sleek new look;" the landscape architecture includes a new plaza with fountain. One potential customer interviewed by The Chicago Tribune said: "It made me want to sit down on a nice day with a cup of tea and a book. OK, in gratitude to Apple, it should be an iPad, but whatever. I say thank you to Apple."

 
The inside of the station has been cleaned, repainted and degrimed, perhaps so it will befit the new Apple name and logos that are now branded everywhere. "From the moment you push through the turnstile, Apple ads beam at you, as bright as searchlights. Down in the tunnel, all the other ads are gone."

To raise additional funds, the CTA may start selling naming rights for stations. For North/Clybourn, Apple has first dibs on the name. The Chicago Tribune says this may not be a bad thing given people will call it the "Apple station" anyway, and many of the city's other older stations are likely also in a state of disrepair and could use some private investment. "The CTA may as well profit from the inevitable. Sell Apple the naming rights, for a big chunk of change. People are going to call it the Apple stop anyway."

Also, the end result of the Apple designer's work wasn't bad: "Apple has created a unique space in Chicago: handsome, communal, connected to the city, a space that makes public transportation attractive." Unfortunately, no information was found on whether long-time Apple-store "stararchitect" Peter Bohlin, who built the new Chicago store, decided to do the station and plaza revamp or a local designer was involved.

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Image credit: Station before and after photos / Good magazine