CHICAGO | General Developments

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by thegoatman

That whole street should be lined with AT MINIMUM 7 story buildings. The more all these 1 story buildings get demolished the better.

Yup, although I don't mind the occasional 4 or 5 story building in the mix. I think it's hard though on streets like this, Broadway, etc in the area because there's some pretty low vacancy rates and a nice mix of businesses. That area does have a fair number of buildings over 7 stories but it should be way more.

[r18tdi]

Originally Posted by marothisu

Nice find! Well, still appears the new building could be in the 7 to 9 floor range though.

9 floors in Lincoln Park? It's possible, but only after 28 months of community meetings and a couple lawsuits mixed in for good measure.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by thegoatman

That whole street should be lined with AT MINIMUM 7 story buildings. The more all these 1 story buildings get demolished the better.

The cheap depreciated retail space along Broadway (mostly one-story "taxpayer" buildings) is a big reason why it's such a great shopping street.

There's nothing wrong with taller buildings in theory, but in practice that means the street frontage will have less retail space and will be priced for only large chains to afford.

[BrinChi]

Originally Posted by ardecila

The cheap depreciated retail space along Broadway (mostly one-story "taxpayer" buildings) is a big reason why it's such a great shopping street.

There's nothing wrong with taller buildings in theory, but in practice that means the street frontage will have less retail space and will be priced for only large chains to afford.

I agree, but does anyone know why this is the case? Sure, the price PSF of retail space in new buildings will be more than these old buildings. But the land value of the building foot print is diluted across more units. I've assumed this is a failure of property tax policy which burdens retail in a way that no longer makes sense in the age of e-commerce.

[Ned.B]

Originally Posted by BrinChi

I agree, but does anyone know why this is the case? Sure, the price PSF of retail space in new buildings will be more than these old buildings. But the land value of the building foot print is diluted across more units. I've assumed this is a failure of property tax policy which burdens retail in a way that no longer makes sense in the age of e-commerce.

I think it's a new building versus old building factor. Similar to apartments, new buildings demand higher rent to cover the cost of the new construction. Property taxes are also typically also higher on a new buildings per square foot with a higher market value.

In either case, I agree that Broadway has a great retail character that I don't think should be messed with, and that includes the variety of building sizes and styles, buildings of varying widths, especially those built on the fine grained width of a city lot. New block long buildings in this city have been typically terrible at creating an urban streetscape and retail fronts anywhere near the quality of what is already there. Take a look at Halsted in Lincoln Park and the southern 1/2 mile of Lakeview for comparison. It's not like either Lakeview or Lincoln Park actually need more density as it is.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by r18tdi

9 floors in Lincoln Park? It's possible, but only after 28 months of community meetings and a couple lawsuits mixed in for good measure.

In that part of Lincoln Park, with many high rises already, that's not going to be an issue. There's numerous 9+ story buildings right in that immediate area.

Also, to call this out ...decent height mid rises or high rises built in Lincoln Park in the last 5 to 10 years:

* Lincoln Park 2550 - 39 story building

* Lincoln Commons: 2 different 21 story buildings plus a 7 story building

* Elevate Apartments - 9 floors although probably the height of a 10+ story building

* 537 W Drummond Pl - Just issued a permit recently for a new 7 story building

* 2753 N Hampden Ct - 2 different 6 story buildings


Also, close enough:
* 508 W Diversey - Technically Lakeview, but right across the street on the border. 10 floors

Also, multiple others right over the border to the south near North & Clybourn


I don't really anticipate people caring as much - the eastern part of Lincoln Park is actually dense (one of the densest parts of the entire city) and has enough mid and high rises already that people aren't weird about it.

[OrdoSeclorum]

Originally Posted by thegoatman

That whole street should be lined with AT MINIMUM 7 story buildings. The more all these 1 story buildings get demolished the better.

I disagree. There are many cities that are about twice as dense as Chicago where buildings over six stories are rare. A mix of heights is great and I think three and four stories for the typical building on a pedestrian-focused neighborhood street is great. That way you don't need elevators and a bunch of other nonsense. Just make it legal to build without parking and make it legal to build wherever one wants to and things will work out.

[thegoatman]

Originally Posted by OrdoSeclorum

I disagree. There are many cities that are about twice as dense as Chicago where buildings over six stories are rare. A mix of heights is great and I think three and four stories for the typical building on a pedestrian-focused neighborhood street is great. That way you don't need elevators and a bunch of other nonsense. Just make it legal to build without parking and make it legal to build wherever one wants to and things will work out.

I agree with the last part but slightly disagree with the first. This part of Clark St. should be Manhattan dense. Very close to downtown and literally right next to the lake with plenty of public transit options and very walkable. 3-5 story buildings are okay, but these little one story buildings are unacceptable.

This is Lincoln Park, not Jefferson or Edison Park

[Randomguy34]

This stretch of Clark IS already close to Manhattan densities. The surround census tracts range from 32k ppsm to 80k ppsm. Even 32k ppsm is denser than much of downtown Chicago and NYC's average density.

[marothisu]

Originally Posted by thegoatman

I agree with the last part but slightly disagree with the first. This part of Clark St. should be Manhattan dense.

While I agree there should be more 6 or 7+ story buildings directly on the street (there's already a handful), I'm not sure you hang out in the area. Here's a breakdown of densities right there:

* Between Fullerton, Clark, Lakewood, and Diversey = 78,444 ppsm
* Between Broadway, Diversey, Belmont, and Inner LSD = 83,323 ppsm
* Between Clark, Fullerton, and Lincoln Park West = 71,381 ppsm
* Between Belmont, Broadway, Lakeshore Drive, and Irving Park = 88,880 ppsm


All of these areas, which are continuous basically from Clark St and then when it changes to Broadway to Lakeshore Drive/Inner Lake Shore Drive up to Irving Park Rd has a combined density of 83,856 ppsm in 0.56 square mile physical area. Now from a Manhattan perspective, it's typically above 100k ppsm but definitely not everywhere. There are parts of Manhattan that are less dense than some of the above and others pretty similar. In Manhattan, the area bounded by 14th St, 6th Ave, 3rd Ave, and 35th St is 81,886 ppsm in just under 0.60 sq mi physical area. That part of Chicago is a little denser than that area of Manhattan at a similar physical area.

[gebs]

I love it when marothisu drops the stats & demographics mic.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by BrinChi

I agree, but does anyone know why this is the case? Sure, the price PSF of retail space in new buildings will be more than these old buildings. But the land value of the building foot print is diluted across more units. I've assumed this is a failure of property tax policy which burdens retail in a way that no longer makes sense in the age of e-commerce.

It's one of those problems with multiple causes. Jane Jacobs summed it up with "new ideas require old buildings" but the economic factors are complicated, especially for people who don't work in CRE. Here's a good summary, it addresses the problems of vacancy generally:
https://ggwash.org/view/68318/why-is...refront-vacant

Essentially, streets like Clark St have a lot of independent landlords. The buildings are individual investments for them rather than a commoditized product held by a REIT, so a vacancy is a big problem for them and not a write-off. Those landlords also have fewer constraints in setting the rent for a space, so they can lower the rent if that's what it takes to make a deal with fewer or no banks/investors breathing down their necks. But any new development will necessarily involve at least one bank and multiple investors, who are happy to let the space sit vacant for years in hopes of landing a "national credit tenant" that will pay top dollar and agree to a long lease term. The larger your investment portfolio, the more you can absorb short-term losses from vacancy offset by a couple of cash cow leases.

Single story buildings are also a lot easier to adapt for different tenants - especially for restaurants that need cooking exhaust systems (black iron), or other types of businesses with unique mechanical requirements. No neighbors upstairs to complain about noise, smell, roaches, etc. The Clark St neighborhood also has huge density, so you have the foot traffic to support a business.

[mh777]

Demo permits issued yesterday for 1806 & 1836 N Kingsbury, & 1909 & 1910 N Clifton. I initially thought these lots would for sure be associated with Lincoln Yards, but after double checking the LY Presentation it seems that they are not. Can anyone confirm?

[r18tdi]

Originally Posted by mh777

Demo permits issued yesterday for 1806 & 1836 N Kingsbury, & 1909 & 1910 N Clifton. I initially thought these lots would for sure be associated with Lincoln Yards, but after double checking the LY Presentation it seems that they are not. Can anyone confirm?

General Iron demo? It's not part of LY, but I'd be shocked if SB wasn't interested in scooping it up.

https://wgntv.com/news/chicago-news/...te-demolition/

[BrinChi]

Originally Posted by ardecila

It's one of those problems with multiple causes. Jane Jacobs summed it up with "new ideas require old buildings" but the economic factors are complicated, especially for people who don't work in CRE. Here's a good summary, it addresses the problems of vacancy generally:
https://ggwash.org/view/68318/why-is...refront-vacant

Really interesting - thanks for sharing the article! It demonstrates how complex the problem is. Have any U.S. cities figured out how to combat the issue? They key advantage of urban living is walkability to useful retail. I get that there's a general glut of retail in the U.S., but I assumed the majority of that glut is in suburbanized locations. Chicago (city) should be dense enough to fully support the majority of its retail locations.

[ardecila]

Originally Posted by BrinChi

Really interesting - thanks for sharing the article! It demonstrates how complex the problem is. Have any U.S. cities figured out how to combat the issue?

Not really. Some cities have tried vacancy tax, with mixed results. There's really not much that policymakers can do, except change the zoning to allow more ground-floor residential, and only mandate retail space in a handful of corridors. That tends to focus the demand. But it's controversial, because the government is picking winners and losers. If they tried such a policy in Chicago, it would undoubtedly punish small business owners on the South and West Sides for choosing to serve a blighted area.

I get that there's a general glut of retail in the U.S., but I assumed the majority of that glut is in suburbanized locations. Chicago (city) should be dense enough to fully support the majority of its retail locations.

This is where e-commerce plays a role. Lots of specialty retail categories once demanded brick and mortar stores. Now there is much less.

Also, Chicago neighborhoods tend to be way down from their population peaks - the number of households is at all-time highs, but household size is at all-time lows. That suppresses the demand for retail as well. The flipside is that in gentrified neighborhoods, the purchasing power is much higher, but it tends to get spent on restaurants and bars, not so much on durable goods.

[BrinChi]

Originally Posted by ardecila

Not really. Some cities have tried vacancy tax, with mixed results. There's really not much that policymakers can do, except change the zoning to allow more ground-floor residential, and only mandate retail space in a handful of corridors. That tends to focus the demand. But it's controversial, because the government is picking winners and losers. If they tried such a policy in Chicago, it would undoubtedly punish small business owners on the South and West Sides for choosing to serve a blighted area.

Makes sense. It just seems there must be other policy levers available to make a difference. In addition to the vacancy tax, how about generally lowering the real estate taxes on retail in mixed-use buildings? Keep them low when filled and creep higher when left intentionally empty. Or going back to taxing based upon street frontage rather than total square feet, encouraging smaller/narrower footprints again. Maybe retail spaces need to be more flexible... so that ETSY shop owners and other small business owners can do rotating popups. No policy is going to be perfect, and there will always be loopholes, but with the growing levels of vacancies it seems that the current order of things must change. We just can't let new retail sit empty for years on end in otherwise vibrant neighborhoods.

[west-town-brad]

another way to improve the vacancy rate of existing retail space is to stop building more retail space.

we simply have too much retail space for today's economy and the zoning has not adapted to that fact. why has there not been an affordable housing push to turn these street level spaces into housing?

new buildings by where I live (bucktown) that have been built in the past 6 years still have mostly vacant retail spaces. these new buildings sit next to old buildings with vacant retail space.

[Klippenstein]

Originally Posted by west-town-brad

another way to improve the vacancy rate of existing retail space is to stop building more retail space.

we simply have too much retail space for today's economy and the zoning has not adapted to that fact. why has there not been an affordable housing push to turn these street level spaces into housing?

new buildings by where I live (bucktown) that have been built in the past 6 years still have mostly vacant retail spaces. these new buildings sit next to old buildings with vacant retail space.

There was talk about this during the corridor study in South Shore, but I'm not sure if anything got implemented.

[thegoatman]

Originally Posted by west-town-brad

another way to improve the vacancy rate of existing retail space is to stop building more retail space.

we simply have too much retail space for today's economy and the zoning has not adapted to that fact. why has there not been an affordable housing push to turn these street level spaces into housing?

new buildings by where I live (bucktown) that have been built in the past 6 years still have mostly vacant retail spaces. these new buildings sit next to old buildings with vacant retail space.

Eh, this depends on the street. Streets that are mini highways like Western, Ashland, Cicero, etc. will of course have empty storefronts. But go visit the more intimate walkable streets like Southport, Damen, and Clark and most of the retail is filled.