Please take this one with a grain of salt, but we recently heard a very juicy rumor about the land where Starbucks and Jewel-Osco sits (Southwest corner of Wabash and Roosevelt). A source tells us that there have been preliminary talks about turning this lot into a multi-purpose high-rise similar to what you see across the street where the Walgreens at State and Roosevelt sits.While we haven't seen anything formal in the press, we heard that the building would have residential, office space and that the street level floors would be retail (including Jewel and presumably Starbucks).
We haven't heard anything in regard to timing or feasbility and in reality feel that this might have a 5% chance of being true. Regardless, it's interesting and something we assume most resident would appreciate.
We often hear complaints about how parking lots disrupt the "urban" feel of the city and this current lot is the poster child for that complaint. We doubt that they would scrap parking if this happened, it most likely would just be tucked behind the building (like Target on Roosevelt).
What do you think? Good? Bad? Not going to happen?
(Image from Google Maps)
