CHICAGO | Boom rundown - everything over 12 floors. v5

[SolarWind]

October 2, 2008
155 North Wacker


October 3, 2008
Silver Tower


Staybridge Suites & Superior 110

[Chicago Shawn]

[cityofblindinglights]

from today


silver tower


155 N Wacker






Superior 110

[honte]

^ Good stuff on this page!

[Chicago Shawn]

10 East Delaware, 10-02-2008






Steel framed cantilever with infill concrete masonry block hanging over an alley to the north



Connections of steel framed cantilever to the north side shear wall of the tower base


Walton on the Park, 10-02-2008

[spyguy]

Project on Jefferson - retail, parking, office space, residential

[the urban politician]

Not bad. Do you have any more details about this, Spyguy? (ie developer, address, timeline, approved status)?

[VivaLFuego]

^ Great find, spyguy,

TUP, there is a PD request posted on the site, so the developer (Jupiter, I believe?) is in the "seeking approval" stage. This looks like a good project, and I like that it's mixed use; this near West Loop area is too close to the downtown core and the commuter rail stations to be turned over completely to residential uses. This sort of high-density, true mixed-use development is exactly what's needed as a transition to the lower-density mixed-use west of the Kennedy.

I wonder how this impacts the Catalyst project. In the first rendering you can see just how close the towers would be; I wonder if this project should maybe have its tower moved flushed with Jefferson street, eliminating that front setback but providing breathing room between Catalyst?

I don't forsee much of a NIMBY problem here, but if anyone hears of any public meetings about this one please let the forum know.

[honte]

Originally Posted by Chicago Shawn

Steel framed cantilever with infill concrete masonry block hanging over an alley to the north

It's the only interesting thing about the building, but it will get dolled-up like the rest and we'll hardly even notice it down the road. Glad you caught it now.

@spyguy, looks acceptable but I suspect it's mostly due to the render. Materials will make or break that one, if it ever breaks ground. Was this an H+P project?

[VivaLFuego]

Originally Posted by honte

@spyguy, looks acceptable but I suspect it's mostly due to the render. Materials will make or break that one, if it ever breaks ground.

The north and south walls could turn out as oppressive as the Harlem-Ontario project in Oak Park that everyone abhors. The gradient shades of gray on the east facade could be very interesting, tough, particularly on the glassy upper residential portion of the tower. The rendering also suggests that the base/podium won't be nearly as oppressive as say, the brutal presence of the 235 Van Buren garage.

What's the story on the building just to the south of this lot? It looks prettyold (I'd guess 1880s?), albeit with an utterly butchered street-level facade (street view link). I had just assumed this building would be toast as part of the development of the parking lot to the north, but apparently not.

[ardecila]

^^ It's an old streetcar barn, but now it functions as an IBEW office. It wouldn't surprise me if the original facade still exists behind the stone panels. I always hoped that one day, IBEW would move into some flashy new building so that this guy could be restored and turned into a retail structure with some nice boutique shops.

[Chi_Coruscant]

http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.com/cgi-bin/page.pl?id=2166

"Chicago: Wolf Point, Orleans St. and West Mart Center Dr., 89-story mixed-use tower, March 2010, $200 million."

[honte]

Originally Posted by ardecila

^^ It's an old streetcar barn, but now it functions as an IBEW office. It wouldn't surprise me if the original facade still exists behind the stone panels. I always hoped that one day, IBEW would move into some flashy new building so that this guy could be restored and turned into a retail structure with some nice boutique shops.

Nice idea. It's a neat building that's always caught my eye. It could compliment this tower and give relief to the big podium... in the same way the RD project could have benefited a lot by retaining the building they instead tore down.

[X-fib2]

Originally Posted by Chi_Coruscant

http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.com/cgi-bin/page.pl?id=2166

"Chicago: Wolf Point, Orleans St. and West Mart Center Dr., 89-story mixed-use tower, March 2010, $200 million."

I wonder if this just repitition of an earlier notice. Funny that if the Wolf Point building is proceeding you would think that a definitive proposal would have been circulated by now.

[spyguy]

Originally Posted by the urban politician

Not bad. Do you have any more details about this, Spyguy? (ie developer, address, timeline, approved status)?

There's about 12,000 sf of retail, roughly 5 floors of parking (~250 cars), 5 floors of office space (~100k sf), and another 300+ units. The height is somewhere around 450 ft IIRC.

They're planning to start construction in late 09 and the building should be LEED certified.

Originally Posted by honte

@spyguy, looks acceptable but I suspect it's mostly due to the render. Materials will make or break that one, if it ever breaks ground. Was this an H+P project?

SCB of course. That makes 4 SCB rental projects around the Loop, if I'm not mistaken.

[honte]

Originally Posted by spyguy

SCB of course. That makes 4 SCB rental projects around the Loop, if I'm not mistaken.

Wait a second... no Wolf Bands, no random curves or interlocking volumes... something funny's going on around here.

The base (bottom two floors) reminds me a bit of Aqua in the first render... not in a good way. But in the second it seems like it might be better executed.

[honte]

I already posted the "bad part" in the 560 Fairbanks thread... but for completeness, I'll post the better part here.

Why is it "better" and not "great"? Because it looks like Hovey will pursue a smaller project on a less-glamorous lot, and also because the St. Clair wasn't a bad looking building at all.

___________

Developer scraps Streeterville condo project, sells site

By Thomas A. Corfman, Oct. 08, 2008
http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=31317

(Crain’s) — Developer Centrum Properties Inc. has killed a proposed 41-story condominium building in Streeterville, selling the site to North Shore developer David Hovey, who plans to eventually build an apartment tower there.

...

[i_am_hydrogen]

From left: St. Clair, Tower III, Fairbanks:


I'm just trying to get the details straight. Some months ago, according to the article below, Hovey was attempting to buy the Tower III site. Instead, he purchased the more prominent St. Clair site. Did the original deal fall through, meaning Centrum still owns the Tower III parcel? Does Centrum plan on developing it as part of the Cityfront project? Or will it lie fallow for the time being?

From Crain's on 6/4/08:

David Hovey, president of Glencoe-based Optima Inc., has a tentative deal to buy a site just north of NBC Tower, 455 N. Cityfront Plaza Drive, from a joint venture that includes Chicago developer Centrum Properties Inc., people familiar with the deal say...

Mr. Hovey’s Streeterville tower would be the third phase of a three-stage high-rise development called Cityfront Plaza that stretches from St. Clair Street to Fairbanks Court along the north side of Illinois Street.

The first phase is a 31-story condo building at the corner of Fairbanks and Illinois, which Centrum completed last fall. About 90% of the building’s 281 units have been sold.

Condo sales have gone more slowly for Centrum’s second phase, a 41-story building proposed for the corner of St. Clair and Illinois. About 40% of the proposed 253 units in that building are said to be under contract.

The 48,431-square foot parcel Mr. Hovey hopes to buy is between the existing building and the site of the second phase.

A key to his project would be a hotel, which would occupy the middle floors of a 50-plus-story tower for which the site is already zoned. The 775,300-square-foot structure would have residential units above the hotel and a parking garage on the lower floors. How many hotel rooms or residential units would be allowed under current zoning could not be determined.

Mr. Hovey already has begun discussions with luxury hotel operators, sources said, although their identities could not be confirmed.

Mr. Hovey has also developed condo buildings in Arizona. In Chicago, he has completed two projects, including a 120-unit development on the Near South Side that was finished in 2003."

http://www.chicagorealestatedaily.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=29677

[honte]

^ Sounds like they're willing to dump 'em both to me... which is OK. I'd prefer the mix-up of designs that eventually will happen.

The best thing about the Cityfront Plaza plan was that it reoriented the tallest tower on axis with the plaza itself, as compared to the Grand Pier proposal which made no sense in that regard. The master plan is still with us, just hopefully with better design.

[cityofblindinglights]

orleans