CHICAGO | Boom rundown - everything over 12 floors. v5

[SamInTheLoop]

Originally Posted by VivaLFuego

^Optima OOW shows that the much-maligned towers-in-the-park design can indeed be awesome (thanks for not including surface parking lots!).

^The article spyguy posted re: sale of "The Curve" site is interesting.

1) Does anyone know, what are the guidelines of the PD approved for that site? Maximum height, allowable units, etc.?

2) the article states Chieftain Group bought the lot on the SW corner of Harrison/Wells; part of the "Franklin Point" area on the former Grand Central site. Maybe we'll see a new proposal for this land before long...

EDIT: see this PDF from their website for a general massing: http://www.chieftain.ie/pdf/grand_central_chicago.pdf
200 bed hotel, two 25-story towers, 15000 sq ft of retail, and a "range of 1, 2, and 3 bedroom" condos. Looks like a small little plaza space right on the corner. Retail along Wells. Parking garage behind the two towers, far away from the street. Construction start in Summer 2009, completion in 2011. Architect is Brinstool + Lynch, which should give a pretty good idea of the aesthetic since B+L doesn't seem to diversify their highrise style much. Height looks to be slightly less than the nearby Wells Street Tower. Rough guess, I'm thinking we're looking at about 300-320ft in height on the towers (Phase II a bit taller), so maybe 350-400 residential units total between them.
Vetro buyers will be ticked. Does the site already have PD approval to build this? Or will they need Fioretti's approval, i.e. have south loop NIMBYs kill the project through dependable pandering?

Wow - surprised to see a proposal so soon for the Harrison and Wells site. I'm glad Brininstool-Lynch is the architect (although Helmut Jahn wouldn't have been too bad I'd say! - I believe he designed the former D2 proposal). I hope both this and the former Curve site see quality developments built as-of-right - the more development we can have in the South Loop with zero input from bobbie the better.

What is really going to be interesting is Franklin Point - how is Fioretti going to react when the developers eventually propose the type of height that the site actually deserves (up to 80 stories or so, just like Park Michigan)?

Also, I noticed in a shopping center trade pub. that Centrum is beginning to list the rental tower as part of Roosevelt Collection in certain advertisements (this wasn't the case as of a couple months ago). Could Centrum be getting ready to begin construction - perhaps a 2009 start?

[simcityaustin]

While I think K Station is ugly, at least it's somewhat clean, and for its' area, it sure is nice. It's nice not to see something with luxury on the rent sign as well.

[i_am_hydrogen]

What's the name of the other building under construction at K Station? Vector?

[Alliance]

Originally Posted by Ch.G, Ch.G

I find myself agreeing with you twice in one night, Alliance.

You're doomed, lol.

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Regarding the attacks on K Station, I just like 'um cuz they're dense.

The higher the density, the lower my architectural IQ (which is already low to begin with). Great cities need a lot of people, and more people=more stores + markets + things do do = more people looking at what's going on around them instead of up at the buildings = nobody will notice the crappy architecture

Still, we might as well try to pack the people into as many quality buildings as possible. I'd rather have lower density and population in better looking buildings then endless fields of 10 story precast blocks with Mansard roofs. I think we're (almost) all pro-density in this area. We just want it to look good too.

[Chicagoguy]

I agree in building density and making the building look nice as well. But I look at the K Station Buildings all day during my classes and I can say that I have seen much worse. Yes they are big and fairly boring, but at least they arent ugly eyesores like alot of older buildings and even some newer ones. One that comes to mind would be the Essex Inn...ugly and retro

[Nowhereman1280]

^^^ I actually like Allure's color. When you are driving in on the Kennedy it really adds color to that part of the skyline which almost entirely consists of green and blue glass, but then you have this super light beige building right in front breaking it all up...

[SolarWind]

June 19, 2008







Cladding for 155 North Wacker's curtain wall is now on site. It was being hoisted to several floors today. The supplier is Permasteelisa which has done work for Hyatt Center, Dearborn Center, One South Dearborn, Millennium Park Pedestrian Bridge, & Soldier Field according to their website.

[Ch.G, Ch.G]

It also says they're doing the Bank of America tower in NY. This one's definitely going to be a winner.

[aaron38]

Hyatt Center's glass is great, let's hope this is on par.

[honte]

^ They also did Trump.... they are one of the best, if not the best, curtain wall mfrs around at the moment.

[dagobert]

Originally Posted by Nowhereman1280

^^^ I actually like Allure's color. When you are driving in on the Kennedy it really adds color to that part of the skyline which almost entirely consists of green and blue glass, but then you have this super light beige building right in front breaking it all up...

I somewhat reluctantly have to agree with Nowhereman. I think that Alluere isn't as inherantly bad as some people say it is. Overall on a 10 point scale (0-being the awful, 10-excellent) I'd rank it 4.5-5. What makes K-station bad is that we aren't going to have just 1 average precast concrete but a number of identically looking buildings clustered in the same area.

[SolarWind]

June 19, 2008

[Tom Servo]

this is going to be an amazing building.

[ardecila]

All you architectural-elitist people love to praise 235 W. Van Buren, and while I love the idea of lots of residents in that location, I HATE the podium design.

It's absolutely deadening and it may in fact be the worst podium design in the city... it doesn't even try to look interesting. What makes it worse is that there's another HUGE garage across the street, so this building is just adding to an already troubling trend.

Ralph Johnson showed a really good handling of the parking podium in both Skybridge and Contemporaine, but more recently, on this and The Peshtigo, he's produced terrible results.

[lalucedm]

235 and The Peshtigo aren't built yet, so one can hardly they producED horrible results, yet. Perhaps the rendering is just terrible - too many people around here base way too strong a reaction on renderings that 1) were probably not super well done to start with 2) may well be different than the building's final design and 3) don't show the full essence of the materials involved. You have to base your pre-impressions on something, of course, but given that the completed buildings are really nice and the not-yet-built ones are seemingly lacking, this seems a better excuse for the disparity.

[cbotnyse]

Originally Posted by AdrianXSands

this is going to be an amazing building.

damn it, I agree with Adrian!

This building will also have a presence in the skyline from the south. I think its a cool design.

[a chicago bearcat]

Even though I have high hopes for this building, we can start to see the proportions of the parking podium in that last photo

and it seems kind of prisonish
but if those slats rise on the same slope as the garage ramp
this could be exactly the kind of asthetically pleasing functional expressionism I've been waiting so long to see in a parking podium.

[a chicago bearcat]

but it will be those details in the end of how the slots are presented and complemented just as lalucedm said

[takascar]

161 W. Kinzie appears to be underway.

According to Emporis its 32 floors. I'm not sure what the rules are regarding starting a thread about a project, though.

Perhaps this one should be marked as "Site Prep/Demo" from "Proposed" in the summary of this thread.

[i_am_hydrogen]

^What did you see occurring at the site? That one totally slipped off my radar. It's a very important project in terms of location.