CHICAGO | General Discussions

[sentinel]

Sorry for the sad news, but Virgil Abloh, the Chicago-reared and based Creative Director/Head Designer for Louis Vuitton and his own line 'Off-White' has died at 41 after battling a rare cancer. He was born in Rockford and received his Master of Architecture degree at IIT. He was an extremely influential designer who helped make street wear visible and accepted in high-fashion circles around the world. RIP :'(

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by sentinel

Sorry for the sad news, but Virgil Abloh, the Chicago-reared and based Creative Director/Head Designer for Louis Vuitton and his own line 'Off-White' has died at 41 after battling a rare cancer. He was born in Rockford and received his Master of Architecture degree at IIT. He was an extremely influential designer who helped make street wear visible and accepted in high-fashion circles around the world. RIP :'(

heartbreaking.

[left of center]

Heard about this on the radio. Terrible news, especially for someone who is so young. My thoughts go out to his friends and family.

[Mr Downtown]

Prof. Thomas Leslie occasionally posts to his Twitter account, @thomasleslieaia , a little game some of you might enjoy: name that Chicago highrise, based on its floorplan. If you're impatient, you'll find the answers on his Twitter account.

The first one wasn't particularly difficult:



Rather more difficult was one he posted this week:

[jpIllInoIs]

1: Jhc
2: Cbot

30 second answer

[Steely Dan]

i think the 1st one is 55 w wacker.

CBOT, with its addition in back, is a good guess for the second one, but the proportions look off to me. it certainly looks like a floor plan of two distinct parts married together.

[pilsenarch]

^naw, the first one is obviously the brutalist 55 W Wacker designed by CF Murphy (the prior iteration of JAHN)...

The second is the stainless steel Harris Bank addition on to the east of the original on Monroe...

[Rizzo]

Second one looks like the Harris Bank complex. Came to mind because I always found it strange how the block is joined together and you can tell one of the building in plan is older.

[Ned.B]

It's definitely the Harris Bank Building plus the east annex. I got it right away this morning but didn't bother logging in to comment. Then again I've been in the building a few times and worked more frequently in the Field Building next door. It's interesting seeing this plan that when the annex was built all of the egress stairs were relocated into it, leaving none in the original building.

I've always found the connection between the buildings at the back to back elevator banks rather awkward.

[ardecila]

Interesting to bring that up, as BMO Harris will be vacating that building once they move to Union Station, and Bank of America already vacated the Field Building. Between the two, there is a whole city block of basically unused office space.

Not sure what happens to these buildings but certainly the city's proposed tax incentives will help reuse. Hotel is the obvious choice but there's already a lot of hotels in the area. Would love to see a big residential conversion here.

[LouisVanDerWright]

I actually love the Harris addition combo, it's like the orignal "historical contrast is good" building.

One dream adaptive reuse for me is Chase Tower into condos or apartments. Or at least the upper floors that are super narrow. Would probably command top dollar especially if you built a tiered roof deck on top.

[Mr Downtown]

Yes, for those who didn't go look, the first floorplan posted was 55 West Wacker.

The second was Harris Bank—but prior to the big 1972 addition at the corner of LaSalle. Only the original midblock building (Shepley, Rutan & Coolidge, 1911) and the almost-delicate 1960 Skidmore Owings & Merrill annex at the corner of Clark.

[sentinel]

Originally Posted by Rizzo

A major issue with the Blick store is it wasn’t functional. Anyone that’s ever shopped there knows how problematic the store layout is. A single level with wide aisles will probably work for them better.

Regarding the Uniqlo on state. I don’t recall any signs indicating a closure as of late December. Pretty sure I would have noticed that.

I wish that somehow a grocery store could be implemented into the upper floors of block 37. Maybe that escalator on Dearborn could take you up into the center of the store which would occupy both floors 2 and 3.

Someday I hope the old Office Depot and urban outfitters will be replaced with a high rise. A hotel or residential will do

Speaking of Block 37, has anything been discussed about the mothballed, lower levels that were supposed to connect to a new CTA stop? I feel that entire affair highlights Chicago and Illinois biggest issues when it comes to infrastructure: lots and LOTS of potential, but no one smart or ethical enough to make it work.

[left of center]

^ Something needs to be done with the "superstation" down there, otherwise I believe the city and/or state will have to pay back the federal funds that went into its construction. I would imagine that those lower levels are going to remain closed until a use is found for that station.

Honestly, I'd be happy with them just reopening the Washington red line station and transfer tunnel to the blue line at this point.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by left of center

^ Something needs to be done with the "superstation" down there, otherwise I believe the city and/or state will have to pay back the federal funds that went into its construction. I would imagine that those lower levels are going to remain closed until a use is found for that station.

Honestly, I'd be happy with them just reopening the Washington red line station and transfer tunnel to the blue line at this point.

It doesn't exist. It was completely removed to build B37's lower levels.

There's really not that much potential for the superstation shell to be used for rail. Maybe there's something creative you could do with it like an Amsterdam-style underground bike garage, but the only thing it's good for on the transit front is Daley's flawed Airport Express plan. I guess you could build a non-revenue track between Red and Blue Lines so it has some kind of transit purpose, if that gets the Feds to back off...

[LouisVanDerWright]

Couldn't they route trains back and forth between the Red and Blue lines down there? It would be Amazing to have alternate routes connecting the two lines.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by LouisVanDerWright

Couldn't they route trains back and forth between the Red and Blue lines down there? It would be Amazing to have alternate routes connecting the two lines.

2 problems with this.

One, there isn't actually a connection there right now. They only built the section inside of Block 37's slurry wall "bathtub". They never connected this to CTA's existing tunnels, which would have been the most complicated part of the job. What exists right now is less of a tunnel, more like a big weirdly-shaped room in the basement.

Don't ask me how they managed to piss away $217M on some framing changes to the basement. It's almost like Daley conned the Federal government into subsidizing a boondoggle shopping mall in order to avoid political embarrassment for clearing Block 37 in the first place...

But suppose CTA spent another $300M to finish the job. The track connection wouldn't really be useful, because train service is a zero-sum game. Every train you route through Block 37 is a train that can't serve the Blue Line's Forest Park branch, or a train that can't serve the North Red Line. The North Red Line is almost at capacity, so by diverting trains you're basically screwing over the North Side. There would also be knock-on effects, since you're adding a flat junction to the busiest part of both Red and Blue Lines (after CTA just spent $1B to eliminate the last flat junction on the Red Line up at Belmont). The flat junctions reduce the absolute number of trains you can run.

[SIGSEGV]

Originally Posted by ardecila

2 problems with this.

One, there isn't actually a connection there right now. They only built the section inside of Block 37's slurry wall "bathtub". They never connected this to CTA's existing tunnels, which would have been the most complicated part of the job. What exists right now is less of a tunnel, more like a big weirdly-shaped room in the basement.

Don't ask me how they managed to piss away $217M on some framing changes to the basement. It's almost like Daley conned the Federal government into subsidizing a boondoggle shopping mall in order to avoid political embarrassment for clearing Block 37 in the first place...

But suppose CTA spent another $300M to finish the job. The track connection wouldn't really be useful, because train service is a zero-sum game. Every train you route through Block 37 is a train that can't serve the Blue Line's Forest Park branch, or a train that can't serve the North Red Line. The North Red Line is almost at capacity, so by diverting trains you're basically screwing over the North Side. There would also be knock-on effects, since you're adding a flat junction to the busiest part of both Red and Blue Lines (after CTA just spent $1B to eliminate the last flat junction on the Red Line up at Belmont). The flat junctions reduce the absolute number of trains you can run.

Too bad we can't use those freight tunnels for anything .

[left of center]

Originally Posted by ardecila

It doesn't exist. It was completely removed to build B37's lower levels.

There's really not that much potential for the superstation shell to be used for rail. Maybe there's something creative you could do with it like an Amsterdam-style underground bike garage, but the only thing it's good for on the transit front is Daley's flawed Airport Express plan. I guess you could build a non-revenue track between Red and Blue Lines so it has some kind of transit purpose, if that gets the Feds to back off...

No kidding, I had absolutely no idea!

So the red line Washington station was demolished then as well? If the B37 Superstation tunnel isn't connected to the red or blue lines currently, shouldn't the station still be intact then? Or did the construction of B37 remove access to the station from the street or somehow make the station inaccessible?

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by left of center

No kidding, I had absolutely no idea!

So the red line Washington station was demolished then as well? If the B37 Superstation tunnel isn't connected to the red or blue lines currently, shouldn't the station still be intact then? Or did the construction of B37 remove access to the station from the street or somehow make the station inaccessible?

OK, so I'm actually mistaken - sort of. I thought the paid transfer tunnel was mid-block, but it's actually directly under Washington St as shown in the diagram above. So it's likely the tunnel still exists.

However, there is a problem at the east (Red Line) end. The Red Line through downtown was built as one long, continuous platform with mezzanines under the middle of each block. So there aren't discrete "stations", just stopping positions on that long platform and mezzanines every block. Those get assigned a certain name for maps.

Anyway, they demolished the section of the Red Line platform right where the stairs down to the transfer tunnel were located, and they likely filled in those stairs with concrete. This was in preparation to make the track connection to the B37 basement level. As far as I know, they stopped work shortly after and never went any further. This made the Washington-Madison mezzanine obsolete, and the Washington-Randolph mezzanine was re-signed for the Lake station.