The long-awaited One South Halsted tower crane is up

Posted on May 27, 2017 by danieldschell

There it is, finally! One South Halsted put up a tower crane for me.

Old Glory, and a Glorious Golden Tower Crane.

The shiny yellow tower crane stub that tantalized us for so long at One South Halsted has finally blossomed into a full-blown Liebherr 316-EC-H 12 crane, spreading joy and heavy materials throughout the Greektown neighborhood of the West Loop.

Twitter user @iYarn let us know last week while we were enjoying the Tower Cranes of London that assembly had started, and the tower crane was completed and operational upon our return. Sorry to have missed it, but the hours of entertainment it’ll provide will more than make up for that disappointment.

: One South Halsted, b/w The Sears Tower.

: One South Halsted, b/w 625 West Adams.

: 4West Loop cranes, though 171 Aberdeen (top) is now gone.

: Close-up.

: From the Madison Street bridge.

: Crane and Flag.

171 Aberdeen drops the tower crane

Posted on May 27, 2017 by danieldschell

A street crane prepares to take down the tower crane at 171 Aberdeen in the West Loop Friday morning.

The last Friday of May was also the last day the tower crane at 171 Aberdeen stood above the West Loop. A crew started bright and early in the morning bringing the crane down, making the West Loop American Flag, Tower Crane, and Water Tank photo opp much more difficult.

171 Aberdeen (165 N Aberdeen now?) is a mixed-use building from MCZ Development, delivering 90 residential units, with 40,000 square feet of office space and 15,000 square feet of retail space, plus 130 parking spots, to the neighborhood. Novak Construction is the GC. Hartshorne Plunkard Architecture the designer.

: When that second crane shows up, you know your tower crane’s doomed.

: Removing counterweights.

: Removing counterweights.

: Your jobs are safe from me.

: No better place to hang out on a Friday of a holiday weekend.

: Prepping the end section of the jib.

: That’s crooked.

: We have separation.

: Down comes the first jib section. Watch out for that L train.

: Stubby crane.

River North’s Moxy Hotel gets Chicago’s most unique tower crane

Posted on May 26, 2017 by danieldschell

Off in the distance stands one of Chicago’s newest tower cranes, at the Moxy Hotel site.

Tower crane parts are delivered the first week of May.

We knew there’d be a crane at the Moxy Hotel site in River North, but when the parts showed up, I asked someone on site and was told it really wasn’t a “tower crane.” But a piece of paper can make all the difference in the world, and as you can see, the City of Chicago’s building permit says it’s a tower crane:

ENGINEERED SUPPORT FOR A LEIBHERR 81 K.1 TEMPORARY SELF ERECTING TOWER CRANE SUPPORTED ON A BALLASTED BASE AND CRANE

Yeah, Liebherr is the correct spelling, but that’s not important. What matters is that this contraption with the weight stack that looks like the bench-press machine from high school goes in my official book as another tower crane for Chicago.

There were similar cranes to this one spotted during a visit to Phoenix this winter, but they were operated from the ground. Since the Moxy Hotel crane requires an operator to make the climb up to a cab, that gives it even more legitimacy. Count it.

: The Tower Crane Permit.

: Remember high school, when we challenged each other to bench the stack? Yes you do.

: The Captain. 2

: The Ship.

One South Halsted builds a tower crane

Posted on May 21, 2017 by danieldschell

Many thanks to Adebayo Onigbanjo (Twitter user @iyarn) for keeping me up to speed on the tower crane at One South Halsted. These photos are from Thursday; alas, the excitement of London got the better of my attention span, so by now, I presume the crane is fully assembled and lifting the heavy stuff.

: All images courtesy of Adebayo Onigbanjo

: All images courtesy of Adebayo Onigbanjo

: All images courtesy of Adebayo Onigbanjo

Walsh Construction celebrates topping out at Hotel Zachary

Posted on May 16, 2017 by danieldschell

A tweet from The Big Green W yesterday confirmed that the Hotel Zachary has reached a construction milestone.

https://twitter.com/thebiggreenw/status/864231518352355329

Then the Hotel Zachary Twitter account joined the fun as well, tweeting a photo of Hickory Street Capital’s Tom Ricketts (you might know him for his other gig as the guy who brought a World Series trophy to Wrigley Field) signing the final beam.

https://twitter.com/hotelzachary/status/864244896110137345

#FlyTheBigGreenW indeed. There’s still a lot of work to do to get the Hotel Zachary into full-functioning hospitality mode, so let’s not put the tower crane on the endangered list quite yet. The 175 rooms and countless eateries will open in 2018 in time for another season of Cubs baseball, plus all the concerts and entertainment Wrigley Field and the newly-opened Park At Wrigley can host.

Tuesday-morning view of the Hotel Zachary from a swift-moving L train. (I blame all my blurry photos on swift-moving L trains.)

Scenes from One Grant Park

Posted on May 15, 2017 by danieldschell

Before we get to the many many photos, a quick recap of One Grant Park:

The address is 1200 South Indiana Avenue in the South Loop. The 76-story apartment tower will have 792 rental units, 622 parking spaces(!), and 12,000 square feet of retail.

Crescent Heights is the developer, Rafael Viñoly Architects did the design, and McHugh Construction is the general contractor. (One Grant Park is one of seven McHugh tower cranes in Chicago right now.)

: Tower Crane #7 for McHugh.

: Don’t know what happened here, but I like it.

Construction Stubdate: No. 508 plants a tower crane in Lake View

Posted on May 15, 2017 by danieldschell

https://twitter.com/SigAlfano/status/863160123841294336

Shout-out to Twitter user @sigalfano who let me know, after some guesswork, that a tower crane stub had been planted at No. 508 (508 West Diversey Parkway) on Friday. It joins One South Halsted in the stub group, with full assembly likely while I’m in England. So take pictures and videos of it going up and send them the blog’s way.

This is the only tower crane in the Chicago skies right now for Macon Construction Group, the general contractor tasked with building the 12-story, 53-apartment Pappageorge Haymes design.

1136 South Wabash keeps climbing into the South Loop sky

Posted on May 11, 2017 by danieldschell

One of Lendlease’s 8 Chicago tower cranes works above 1136 South Wabash in the South Loop.

Ever wonder which general contractors have the most tower cranes in the air around Chicago? Well, for right now, the leader in the clubhouse is Lendlease with 8. Power Construction and McHugh Construction are hot on their heels with 7 apiece.

One of Lendlease’s cranes is busy stacking floors atop floors at 1136 South Wabash. 1136 was previously best known for obscuring Hebru Brantley’s Flyboy mural on the wall of next-door neighbor 1132 South Wabash Avenue. But art lives on, and it’s time to recognize the new Solomon Cordwell Buenz-designed project for bringing 320 new apartments to the South Loop. Developed by CA Ventures, there will also be 143 parking spaces in the 26-story tower. Never mind that you’ll be able to fall out of bed and land in Stan’s Donuts, or Five Guys, or Belly Up Smokehouse, or Eleven City Diner, but 1136 South Wabash is also about 7 long strides from the Roosevelt CTA station. That’s delicious convenience right there.

The Crane Doctor to make a house call at Illume Chicago

Posted on May 10, 2017 by danieldschell

Putting the Ill in Illume…The tower crane at Illume Chicago needs some repairs.

Expect a street closure Thursday in the 100-block of South Peoria Street, as a street crane sets up to make repairs on the tower crane holding court above Illume Chicago. Weather permitting, repairs shouldn’t last more than a day, and Peoria Street will be back in business Friday.

There are no tower cranes in The Loop. Will 145 South Wells end the drought?

Posted on May 10, 2017 by danieldschell

Rendering of 145 South Wells from Thomas Roszak Architecture. Yep, that’ll need a tower crane.

For all the development in Chicago, none of it includes a tower crane in The Loop. The two most recent cranes, at Linea (215 West Lake Street) and 151 North Franklin, have been gone since December and April, respectively. So who will swoop in to save us from this wretched cranelessness?

145 South Wells could be the right candidate. After receiving a demolition permit in mid-March to tear down the small parking garage on site, the lot looks clean and ready to be prepped for the latest project from developer Moceri + Roszak: a boutique office building that will re-team them with design architect Thomas Roszak Architecture. (They worked on Linea together.) Renderings show a tower somewhere in the 15-20-story range. That’s sure tower-crane territory. As for when construction gets underway (looks like Clark Construction will be the general contractor) that remains to be seen; permits have yet to be issued to start construction.

: That’s nice scaffolding and all, but it won’t do a tower crane’s job.

: My hunch about the GC is based on this sign.

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