A pair of pending permits in the Chicago Data Portal give reason for hope that 566 West Van Buren is about to come to life. The residential project in the West Loop from Riverside Investment & Development stalled after it appeared ready to kick off construction back in 2022.
A new pending permit for 566 West Van Buren Street hit the Chicago Data Portal on August 22 of last year, and with it came some notable changes to its height and parking capacity from its previous iteration. The original foundation & superstructure permit, which was dated July 22, 2022, called for a 14-story apartment building with 75 parking spaces on the two lowest floors. As that permit is now more than 36 months old, it has been removed from the portal.
2022 rendering of 566 W Van Buren Street by Antunovich Associates
Site context rendering of 566 W Van Buren Street by Antunovich Associates
Ground floor rendering of the 2022 plan by Antunovich Associates
Third floor (left) and top floor (right) plans from 2022 by Antunovich Associates
The permit that’s now pending calls for a 12-story building with just 42 ground-floor parking spaces. Unchanged is the number of residences, although the new permit calls for one more unit than the original 198. There are to be 199 bicycle spaces on the ground floor with the parking. Original plans called for a 2,500-square-foot corner retail space along with the lobby and a dog run on the first floor, but it is not clear if those are still in the plans, and where they would be located.
On Thursday February 5, another pending permit hit the portal, this time for a Potain MR418-model tower crane. Unlike the first permit, this one includes the contracting team. Clark Construction is named as the general contractor, and Adjustable Concrete is the concrete contractor who will operate the tower crane. Designs for the building were drawn up by Antunovich Associates.
The project goes before the Chicago Zoning Board of Appeals on the 20th of this month to review an application for a variation to allow alternative compliance with the open-space requirements and for a special-use application.
Van Buren and Jefferson, July 31, 2022. Photo by Daniel Schell
Van Buren and Jefferson, February 7, 2026. Photo by Daniel Schell
560 (left) and 558 West Van Buren Street pre-demolition, July 31, 2022. Photo by Daniel Schell
The building would replace a surface parking lot on the northeast corner of West Van Buren and Jefferson Streets expanded by a pair of demolitions. Both 558 and 560 West Van Buren were permitted for demolition on October 28, 2022 in anticipation of getting the new project started. The time might be now.
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Good lord I can’t believe I’ve become one of these people, but for such a prime location (a corner lot in West Loop) this project seems unambitious (small).
I’m a subscriber to the general idea that any meaningful development is to not be complained about (within reason). If every remaining parking lot in the Loop and adjacent neighborhoods were filled with these 12-story buildings, the economic activity would be immense, and developers would be on the hunt for opportunities to buy up these buildings and replace them with 20-, 30-, 40-, etc. story towers. While I would love to be in the place where every new development was a 50-story tower, that’s not where we are at, so the next best bet is any form of meaningful development.
Agreed. As proposed, this is still a major improvement for the area.
Exactly right.
RIP Bombacigno’s meatball sandwich and minestrone. Great old time shop with mostly original interior and 1970s-80s decor. Closed with the pandemic.