Well it looks like the South Loop Casino proposals for The 78 and One Central are sitting on a "bust" hand and waiting for the final card to be played (via Sun-Times):
Mayor Lori Lightfoot is preparing to turn over her cards in the Chicago casino game, with all signs pointing to a winning hand for Bally’s Corporation and their River West bid, sources told the Chicago Sun-Times on Tuesday.
The city signaled in a March report that Bally’s proposal for the Chicago Tribune printing plant site at Chicago Avenue and Halsted Street was the front-runner over two other finalists for the casino. An official decision could come Thursday.
The publicly traded Rhode Island corporation was the only one to offer an upfront payment of $25 million for the license — and was projected as the top revenue generator over a Hard Rock casino proposed across DuSable Lake Shore Drive from Soldier Field, and the so-called “Rivers 78” plan backed by billionaire Neil Bluhm for the South Loop. Those are key considerations for city officials desperate to start pumping casino tax revenue into depleted police and firefighter pension funds.
If this reporting is accurate from the Sun-Times, the South Loop got lucky. Although a casino would have given these developments a big shot in the arm and likely accelerated their plans, it would have brought a completely new element to the neighborhood which likely would have altered it dramatically forever.
It's not over yet, but seems like a positive development for the neighborhood.
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