The demolition work for 707 N Wells is well under way should complete this week.

Along those lines, I have a meeting with the developers tomorrow. I'm the condo board president for buildings that directly abut the construction and we'll be talking through some items that impact us.

If anyone with experience with construction directly adjacent to existing buildings was willing to send me a P.M. with tips or pointers on things I should be bringing up with them I'd surely appreciate it. So far we want to talk to them about any maintenance that should be done to our brick walls prior to them having their walls 8 inches from ours, about their 6-8 month blockading of the shared alley, and a few similar things, but maybe there are other less obvious things that someone with direct experience with this sort of situation might know about that I should bring up with them. I expect it to be a cordial, productive meeting and don't expect it to be conflict-oriented, so any tips on keeping it that way would be welcome, too.

PS, that tower planned for across from Target on Division must be moving forward as they've cleared the entire site now.

Yeah, it's actually been leveled completely for about a month now. YoChicago wrote about it 3 weeks ago: http://yochicago.com/demolition-comp...nt-site/35471/


In other, smaller news - 3 new 6 unit buildings are coming to the 1800 block of N California on vacant lots just north of the 606 (as well as a new SFH on vacant lot next to all of them). The good news is that it was originally supposed to be all SFHs and is part of the California Estates area (http://yochicago.com/new-constructio...estates/26833/). So we get some increased density from what was originally supposed to go there.

Curbed has an article about the 29 story, 469 unit building at 1000 S Clark. Looks like it's officially in site prep mode

http://chicago.curbed.com/archives/2...ment-tower.php

Finally registered after lurking for several years since I just had to post about this building.

The UofC is in a somewhat unique position. It doesn't actually have the same recognition in the US as the Ivies, but is very, very well known world-wide and draws scholars - especially at the Graduate level - from around the world. Chicago is actually a member of a group called the "Ivies Plus" which in addition to MIT and Stanford mentioned above also included Duke and Hopkins. Although only established in 1893 (in a second incarnation, hence the use of the Phoenix on the logo) it was deliberately founded as a complete institution and grew rapidly. In almost every metric it can hold its own against the Ivies.

Back to the building, which is the point here. It is stunning, and even more so is the transformation of the former street between it and the Oriental Institute across the way. Everyone should take a journey down to Hyde Park to see it in real life.

707 N Wells is still waiting on building permits, but they expect them soon. When it does get built, it will be built on caissons and not piles, if anyone was curious.

Also, the building on the NW corner of Clark and Huron is going forward although I don't have any timeline for it.

That's awesome - no timeline at all even when they should expect to start any work? Another downtown surface lot bites the dust...

^^ ^ Huron and Clark is the mid-rise designed by Booth Hansen, correct?

Also, emathias, any last minute design changes, to make 707 look a little less....I don't know.....brutally ugly?? Any smidgen of hope?

How rude of us - welcome to (posting on) the forum!

Anyone know why they're already removing the new shops at northbridge signage and wall thing on grand and Rush?

Maybe they realized it is ass ugly and less comprehensible than the previous signage...

I think the plan is to cut windows into the Grand Ave side.

^. I hope so, they have to do something. The shops at North Bridge has no less than a detestable design. It looks like it belongs in Minneapolis or something. Just a lousy piece of shit of a building. More windows would help, but I wish they would do even more than that liven its street presence

^ Agreed. If anyone has been to Singapore - the Vivo City Mall (probably the same size or larger than Northbridge) sets the gold standard for urban malls in my opinion.

I kind of wish Navy Pier was a virtual reincarnation of Vivo City, so then us local Chicagoans would actually want to spend time at Navy Pier alongside the tourists.

Sure, but the purpose is far different than the Ivies - reflected in the school motto "Crescat scientia; vita excolatur" - "Let knowledge grow from more to more; and so be human life enriched." Rockefeller purposely funded a midwestern university to be geographically and fundamentally distanced from the Ivies. The advancement of human knowledge is the primary purpose; education of a student body is only by necessity. It has attracted scholars from around the world because it allowed them the freedom that few other universities offered.

100 years ago, the difference was noticeable; in modern times universities have evolved so much that it is hard to notice. Which is part of the reason that U of C is undertaking such a massive construction and development spree. It is a recognition that it must do more to continue to attract the kind of people it used to take for granted.

I went there last year - it's rather an interesting mall. I didn't find it anything that special to be honest, though the building design was cool and the fact that a tram goes directly to it is also cool (you can technically find that in Arlington, VA too).

It's much different than the mall in Chicago though because in reality, it's not really surrounded by much. It's next to water, but there's a bunch of open land across the street from it and actually quite a bit around it that's fairly open. You have to go a little north of that before it starts filling up and even then, while there's many high rises there they are more suburban and have some space between them. Which in Singapore is nice because that whole area is so lush.

This is what I'm talking about which is not that far from Vivo City:
https://fbcdn-sphotos-e-a.akamaihd.n...06581093_n.jpg

A shot of the mall:
https://fbcdn-sphotos-g-a.akamaihd.n...710b86cc3bb23f

Area just a little west of Vivo:
https://fbcdn-sphotos-a-a.akamaihd.n...76272405_n.jpg


I do think that a better comparison is Navy Pier though - but they're still completely different things. Navy Pier is more of an entertainment center with touristy things while Vivo City is a legitimate mall. I do think they should adopt the Tram thing though.


Also, some interesting architecture outside of that:
https://scontent-b-iad.xx.fbcdn.net/...67449878_n.jpg

Speaking of Navy Pier, there's a public meeting about it on Tuesday at 6pm. 375 E. Chicago Ave., First Floor. I hope they've got some firm details.

Here are some images of the Chinatown Library site. They are of particularly poor quality, but give you an idea of how much has been done.

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3864/1...ab4e7ab7_b.jpg

http://farm3.staticflickr.com/2926/1...4c3e946d_b.jpg

http://farm6.staticflickr.com/5582/1...d919a3e5_b.jpg

^ You beat me to it. I was planning on going there this weekend to check it out and take some pics. My last pics were just after they cleared off that parking lot. Should be a very welcome addition to the neighborhood!

P.S. Did you see how far along that 72 room hotel is on Archer/Wentworth? A month or so ago it was 3 floor high with one more to go. Moving along very slowly.

Yeah, I could take a couple pictures of that too. It's being built extremely slowly, and all but stopped for over a month. They have just about topped out the fourth floor though. I've only ever seen one or two guys working on it.