urbanSTL

The banking giant, which owns and occupies the 60-story Chase Tower, recently toured several sites and listened to pitches from developers looking for an anchor tenant to kick off construction of a new skyscraper, according to people familiar with the search.
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Another factor likely to influence Chase’s thinking: Bank of America and BMO Financialare relocating and putting their names on brand-new Chicago towers.  Bank of America Tower recently opened along the river at 150 N. Wacker Drive, and construction of BMO Tower recently topped out on a site alongside Union Station. Both of those developments are by Chicago-based Riverside Investment & Development.

Real estate experts believe it’s unlikely America’s largest bank will sit idle as rivals make major upgrades of their space, suggesting Chase will either overhaul space in its 52-year-old building or relocate. In New York, Chase recently demolished its longtime office building, and it’s now constructing one of the city’s tallest skyscrapers on the same full-block site.

Billions of dollars and tens of thousands of jobs could soon begin flowing to a sprawling South Side site that was once the centerpiece of Chicago’s failed bid for the 2016 Olympics, and that more recently was pitched for the city’s bid to land Amazon’s HQ2.  The City Council on Wednesday approved the sale of the former Michael Reese Hospital site and zoning for a $4 billion mixed-use redevelopment, inching the proposed Bronzeville Lakefront project closer to breaking ground.

Infrastructure work is expected to begin within the next few months.

The $97 million sale of the medical campus will allow a coalition of development companies to move forward on nearly 8 million square feet of commercial, institutional and residential spaces, according to the city’s Department of Planning and Development.

A Chicago developer hopes to nail down city approval for a Near North Side apartment tower, after taking the unusual step of increasing the height from its previous proposal despite vocal opposition from neighboring condominium owners.

During public comment, Andrew Galakatos, of the Maryland Walk high-rise condominiums building at 8025 Maryland Avenue, criticized “the rush to build a 22-story high-rise building though the effects of four major apartment projects (coming nearby) aren't known and there will be inadequate parking.” He also contended there had been inadequate notice to nearby home and condo owners such as in the Clayton Gardens and Old Town Clayton developments.

Jobs span across sales, sales engineering, services, collaboration and operations roles, according to a Cisco spokesman. The Tribune reported in 2019 that Cisco was negotiating rent on 130,000 square feet of office space in the long-vacant old post office. The new Cisco space can accommodate 1,200 employees.

The project would come with a restructuring of a nearby track crossing, and early estimates put the total cost for both projects between $1.4 billion and $1.7 billion. Most of the money, which would likely include federal funding, would go toward the track restructuring, according to the presentation.
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Accompanying the new station would be construction of a flyover at a rail crossing near Kinzie Street and Western Avenue, intended to remove a bottleneck, said David Kralik, Metra’s department head for long-range planning.  Four Metra lines operate through the crossing, and three other lines use the crossing to access maintenance facilities. Amtrak also runs 16 trains through the intersection, he said.

He compared the intersection to “a four-way stop sign in the middle of an expressway,” and said the flyover was necessary to build the proposed new station.