2024 NASCAR Chicago Street Race: Live updates

Heading downtown? Visiting Chicago? Prepare for major street closures around Grant Park, including parts of DuSable Lake Shore Drive, Michigan Avenue, Roosevelt Road, Columbus Circle, Ida B. Wells and more.

It’s best to take public transportation, or avoid the area all together if you don’t need to be downtown, but if you do there are alternate routes in place.

ABC7 Traffic Anchor Diane Pathieu has all the details.

It’s day two of NASCAR Family Fest at Navy Pier ahead of this weekend’s big race.

The streets of downtown are transforming into a 2.2 mile circuit for a second year straight.

This year’s pre-race thrills include photo ops with cars, a live competition among top racing pros and a simulation of this weekend’s racecourse.

The high-octane family-fun revving up excitement for fans both young and old.

A number of street closures are already in place as the July 4 holiday approaches .The city began closing streets to construct the NASCAR Street Race course in late June.

As of Wednesday morning, major downtown streets like Jackson Drive, Balbo Drive, DuSable Lake Shore Drive, Congress Circle and Michigan Avenue are closed in part or in full as the course is built.

Work takes a pause until Thursday night at 9 p.m.

See the full list of street closures already in effect and on deck before the weekend

ABC7 got a tour of the NASCAR Street Race course Tuesday, as massive concrete barriers popped up to map it out and the steel stands started to come together.

More than 100 kids got to play pit crew and learn about NASCAR at a Boys and Girls club event, then were gifted free tickets to the race. It’ll be the first NASCAR event for many.

Navy Pier’s NASCAR family fest also kicked off Tuesday night, a two-day celebration of all things racing.

NASCAR Street Race course takes over downtown Chicago as race day approaches