Alright, alright, it's still in "visionary" stage but major media outlets are talking about it with a straight face: Steve Fifield's plan to cap the Kennedy between Washington and Adams. That three blocks' coverage would encompass eight to 12 acres of public park which would (or could) lure office development along its edges. The $45M price tag, if partially covered by TIFs, would pay for itself once new office tenants arrived, as Fifield explains to Crain's. And not just any office towers will do, Fifield and his architect Scott Sarver of smdp LLC want a hub of offices that attract the "businesses of tomorrow." As Sarver puts it, "Data, fiber, technology, finance — those are the tenancies that are growing now; those are the new spaces. The opportunity for Chicago is to ... physically embody and personify this transformation that's happening rather than just to let it happen naturally — to actually be proactive about it." The architect-developer partnership in this master planning endeavor is significant since Sarver is already designing two 20-story office towers that Fifield plans to build at 601-625 W Monroe— essentially the first members of the high-tech "office hub". The cap design is less futuristic than some of those coming out of Chicago's Central Area Plan in 2003, but the thrust is similar and the execution more believable. Bring it!
·West Loop II? Ambitious plan would cover Kennedy, create office hub [Crain's]
·Prior Kennedy Cap Coverage [Curbed Chicago]
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