ELEVATE Lincoln Park isn’t technically being demolished. Lincoln Centre is being demolished, to make room for ELEVATE Lincoln Park. And there isn’t much of it left, as anyone who rides the Red, Brown, or Purple line can tell you.
In the first week of July, three tower cranes were planted around Chicago. My job was to go find them. Then, it was my duty to follow up on them. Because no one wants part of the story. Or part of the tower crane, for that matter.
Our first update is at the DePaul School of Music. Warning: Don’t get too close to this one, or it won’t fit in your photo. This won’t be a tall undertaking, but it’s a big lot. And a tower crane needs to reach every corner of that lot. So this one is as long as any I’ve seen.
Work crews were using the 111 West Chestnut excavation as a parking lot. Has to be a good reason for that, right?
The Chestnut Row Homes were approved by the Chicago Plan Commission way back in February 2015. And the commission didn’t just approve the Tawani Enterprises development. They raved about them.
The foundation permit, issued 9 months ago.
The City of Chicago filed a foundation permit for the project, at 111 West Chestnut Street in the Near North, on October 21. Dirt was dug, piles were driven.
And then…nothing.
Until now. Maybe. As 833 North Clark rises across the street, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints meetinghouse begins its foundations next door, and the Bush Temple project rolls along next to that, there’s activity at Chestnut Row Homes as well.
Part of the reason for the delay, or a result of it, could be a change in general contractors. Cordos Development is out. Berglund Construction is in. They’re job? Eight townhomes designed by Booth Hansen, each three floors, each with two private parking spaces. And these will be rentals, by the way. To the tune of about $15,000/month.
Tawani originally hoped to have these homes completed by now. 2017 is now the targeted finish.
Where did all that equipment go? 165 North Desplaines is (temporarily) very quiet.
Tear it down.
Smooth it over.
Dig the holes.
Smooth it over.
Such is the cycle of life for a construction site. We’re in that fourth phase now at 165 North Desplaines. It’s eerily quiet, now that caisson equipment has been shipped off (is some of it now at 3Eleven?).
Of course, the silence won’t last. Expect Power Construction to swamp the lot soon to build the foundation and set up a tower crane. (Perhaps in that first big hole in the southwest corner of the lot?)
Seems to me this could be a good place for a new tower crane.
Things got all smoothed over in June, too. After demolition was complete, but before caisson work started.
Shout-out to Power Construction for having a chair waiting for me on site.
Spotted at 3Eleven, another Power site. Did it travel direct from 165 North Desplaines?
Shrubbery in the 590 Madison pocket park.
It may look more like a Christmas tree farm than a pocket park, but at least something is happening at 590 West Madison Street in the West Loop. And that could mean something much, much bigger is just ahead.
As the Chicago Architecture Blog reported back in February, 590 Madison is an office tower proposed for the block of North Jefferson Street stretching from Madison to Washington. But the city said no such tower can be built until the pocket park at the Washington end of the lot is addressed. And address it they have.
590 Madison dreams of being a 41-story tower. Designed by Goettsch Partners, it would have a 330-room hotel on the lower floors, the 616,000 square feet of rentable office space from the 19th floor on up. But we must wait and see. Let’s get that park finished up first, then look for permission from the City of Chicago to start building.
I repeatedly started typing “parket” instead of “pocket park” during the making of this post. Can we just make “parket” a thing?
The historic facade that Brooklyn Bowl saved, and will integrate into the new facility.
There’s no time to spare. Brooklyn Bowl, coming to the West Loop at 832 West Fulton Market, has been in the works for years, and developer Convexity Properties had hoped of opening in 2015. That frame ended up a gutter ball. But Brooklyn Bowl is rolling right down the center of the lane again.
A rendering of the new Brooklyn Bowl from Convexity Properties.
W.E. O’Neil, the general contractor on the project, has been toiling away since last summer, when the century-plus-old cold storage buildings came down. All except for two walls, that is. Historic Preservation architects AltusWorks, tasked with preserving the facades, left two walls up — one along Fulton Market, one along Peoria Street — and will rebuild the portions they disassembled.
Designed by the West Loop’s own OKW Architects, Brooklyn Bowl will be a three-story building: the ground floor will be retail, while the second and third floors will comprise the bowing lanes and entertainment/event spaces. There will also be one level below grade for parking.
Foundation work at CA Washington.
The 3-bedroom, 3-bathroom condominiums from Belgravia Realty Group have begun taking up residence at 27 North Aberdeen Street in the West Loop. CA Washington will have 69 condos within its six stories, with 78 indoor parking spaces.
Consider CA Washington as having three significant addresses. The foundation permit, issued June 17th, lists 27-39 North Aberdeen and 28-40 North Carpenter Street both as official addresses, a sentiment echoed on Belgravia’s website. In addition to that, CA Washington sits directly across Washington Boulevard from the former Harpo Studios (Oprahland, unofficially), and the future McDonald’s HQ.
CA Washington is a design from Lewis Wilson of Sullivan, Goulette & Wilson. They’ve teamed with Belgravia before, including the under-construction Sedgwick at Locust at 367 West Locust Street in the Near North (the former site of Saint Dominic’s Church). The general contractor at CA Washington is Maris Construction.
Setting the tower crane base, bright and early this morning.
It was an inadvertent Tower Crane Tuesday post. And here we are on Thursday, and it’s already obsolete. But in the good way. For no longer are there six tower crane permits awaiting actual tower cranes. No, my friends, now there are five.
https://twitter.com/BuildUpChicago/status/753393411969970176
https://twitter.com/BuildUpChicago/status/753580641397116929
625 West Adams trucked in the base of its new tower crane yesterday, and wasted no time this morning rooting it into the ground. It’s one of those pretty yellow ones, too. And it will be right outside my window. Thank you, Power Construction. You know the way to my heart.
Please let me know if there’s an angle of this crane you’d like to see that I haven’t included below…
It will take longer than 18 seconds, but the garages will be demolished.
708 + 712 = 710.
Oh, I’m sorry. Were you told there would be no math? Allow me to explain.
Yesterday, the City of Chicago filed two demolition permits for properties at 708 West Grand Avenue and 712 West Grand Avenue. The owner of those structures is Wicker Park Apartments, and this is where they’ll erect 710 Grand, a 9-story building at 710 West Grand Avenue in River West with 105 apartments. Included will be 45 parking spaces and 5,000 square feet of retail space. 710 West Grand is a design from Brininstool + Lynch (1333 & 1345 Wabash, among many others.) Recyclean will handle the demolition.
***UPDATE: The City of Chicago issued a third demolition permit, on Thursday the 14th. This one is for the 4-story building between the two “garages.” All three buildings, 708, 710, and 712 West Grand Avenue are now ready to come down.***
Rendering of 710 West Grand from Brininstool + Lynch.
Rendering of 710 West Grand from Brininstool + Lynch.
712 and 708 West Grand Avenue. That 4-story will come down too, but not the condo building on the far right (hidden by tree)
The demo permit for 708 West Grand. The permit for 712 looks pretty much the same.
It’s no one-story garage, but this is the current 710 West Grand. It will be demolished.
So, pretty much everything you see here, except the cars, gets demolished. 708-712 West Grand Avenue.
The third piece to the puzzle; a demo permit for 710 West Grand Avenue.
That tower crane off in the distance is building the Ace Hotel, with the help of that cement rig.
An Ace Hotel is on the rise at 311 North Morgan Street in the West Loop. Developed by Sterling Bay, the Ace is dealing 159 keys to the primo location directly across the street from Google’s office building at 1000 Fulton Market.
The design, by Chicago’s GREC Architects, will feature a green roof, first-floor retail, and 30 underground parking spaces. Power Construction has been on the build since last fall, including painstaking efforts to preserve the historic facade that faces Morgan Street.
Because the word “boutique” is fun to use, I will mention that the Ace will be a boutique hotel.
Building Up Chicago 