Please Build Here is a fun rubric tailor-made to complement Curbed's wandering eye. Basically, it gives us an excuse to ogle vacant land and dream. For each neglected property we'll tussle with development options, focusing on the most plausible or, sometimes, just our favorite.
We're amplifying the call for a benevolent builder to come along and give this plum Milwaukee Avenue development parcel the heroic treatment. With Congress Theater at its door, a new attempt at sale is being made after a three-year listing hiatus. The owner had spent the three previous years trying—and failing—to sell the roughly 15,000-square-foot parcel. The major difference this time around is the condition of the property. No longer is the unsightly auto garage/impounding lot on site: the parcel is flattened, the cars given the boot. That should make the $850K price tag worth some new consideration. The C-1 zoning permits a developer to build to the property line in each direction, so long as the property doesn't abut a residential-zoned lot. There is a single-family home across an alley from the parcel, along Rockwell Street. That could have some bearing on the rear setback, but a minimal one.
This stretch of Milwaukee is a sort of nebulous zone at the border of Logan and Bucktown with a blotched mix of light industry/warehousing, neighborhood commercial, multi-unit residential, vacant lots, and the heavy hand of gentrification creeping in from all sides. It's a dreary stretch at all times of day. This site's zoning is characterized by ground-floor 'neighborhood commercial' with an option for residential above. We humbly submit: please use that option. What are the chances for urbane development? It's tough to say. Developers love an easy buck.
·Listing: 2161 N Milwaukee Ave [Jameson Commercial]
·Please Build Here [Curbed Chicago]
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