(rshsdepot) Union Station - Chicago, IL

[Bernie Wagenblast <brwagenblast_@_comcast.net>]

Architect plans a Burnham revival

February 13, 2002

BY DAVID ROEDER SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST

Chicago's busiest architect has developed an unusual specialty--updating
Daniel Burnham. When the time seems right for new office space downtown, two
renovations planned by Lucien Lagrange are liable to proceed to the
detriment of developers who build from the ground up.
Last week, the Chicago landmarks commission approved Lagrange's plan to
expand Union Station, adding 18 stories to one section of the eight-story
rail terminal. In the plan advanced by Amtrak, the station's owner, and
Prime Group Realty Trust, the addition would accommodate condos, a hotel and
about 480,000 square feet of office space.
Lagrange is working on a similar "topping off'' project for 175 W. Jackson.
The building sits in the shadow, literally and figuratively, of the Chicago
Board of Trade, yet it's one of the most massive structures in town.
Lagrange is sketching a 16-story addition for one part of the 22-story,
block-long giant. The proposal is just speculation at this point, but 175 W.
Jackson's owner, New York-based Intell Management & Investment Co., has been
discussing it with potential tenants.
Union Station and 175 W. Jackson were designed by the Burnham firm. They
were built at roughly the same time, with their first sections completed
about 90 years ago, and exhibit the urban visionary's fondness for stately
columns, grand interior spaces and natural light. Both got a
Lagrange-inspired renovation in the 1990s. And happily for their owners,
both were designed to accommodate the high-rise additions that Lagrange
would give them.
That means no excavations and no disruptions for the current users while the
work goes on, producing advantages in time and costs.
For Union Station, the addition would fit with the original's style, using
masonry because it's not possible to duplicate the limestone from Burnham's
time, Lagrange said. It would preserve the skylight of the Great Hall
waiting room and create a shaft above it for another skylight visible to
those in the high-rise.
Lagrange said he'd match the cream terra cotta of 175 W. Jackson and make
use of one of its two interior light courts. The project would add about
500,000 square feet to the building, an expansion of about one-third.
With a $80 million makeover that brought in new mechanicals, 175 W. Jackson
has done well in the market without being the grand slam its owners hoped
for. The building is 85 percent occupied, compared with 30 percent in the
late 1990s, while trying to sell a South Loop location to users who
increasingly prefer Wacker Drive. Lead tenants include insurance broker Aon
Corp., Harza Engineering and the trading firm O'Connor & Co.
But add its prospective space to what will come at Union Station if the
financing comes through and you've got a million square feet, the equivalent
of a 50-story building downtown. With their classical flourishes, the
buildings offer alternatives to companies tired of steel-and-glass
austerity.
BLOCKED 37: City officials were pleased last week that their developers'
conference on the Block 37 project drew an overflow crowd to the City
Council chambers. Under a city-mandated process, developers now have until
March 22 to submit qualifications for taking on the site between the Daley
Center and Marshall Field's. The plans calls for three finalists to be
picked in April and a winner in May.
NEW POST: One of Chicago's longtime real-estate executives, Van Pell, is now
working as a consultant for the owners of Marina City's commercial space.
Pell, formerly of Transwestern Commercial Services, said he is also
establishing an investment group to buy undervalued properties in Chicago.
HOUSING FORECAST: Analyst David Ricci at Chicago's William Blair & Co. LLC
has concluded that home sales are likely to slip as the year progresses,
with the extent of the downturn determined by interest rates. He said that
could translate into weakness for home-improvement retailing by the end of
2002. So don't say you weren't warned.
DOING THE DEALS: Julien J. Studley Inc. represented the Commodity Futures
Trading Commission in its lease of 40,750 square feet at 525 W. Monroe. ...
Prentiss Properties signed up four financial firms as tenants at 123 N.
Wacker, led by a lease for 45,000 square feet to Man Group PLC, which took
the top three floors. The 30-story building, which Aon Corp. vacated in its
move to the former Amoco Building, is now 60 percent leased. ... Orix Real
Estate Equities Inc. said construction is done at its 11-story Pointe O'Hare
office building at Higgins and River roads in Rosemont. But with the
suburban market in the doldrums, less than 20 percent of its 263,000 square
feet is spoken for. ... Inland Group Inc. brokered the $3.15 million sale of
an industrial building at 6 Territorial Court, Bolingbrook, to Illinois
Paper Co. The buyer is consolidating from two sites in Lombard.

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