Hines plans towers on McDonald’s office building site in Oak Brook

Hines wants to tear down a McDonald’s office building in suburban Oak Brook and replace it with several towers, a decision that comes just weeks after the burger behemoth moved its nearby corporate headquarters to Fulton Market in Chicago

The Houston-based developer has a preliminary agreement for the 328,000-square-foot McDonald’s Plaza building north of the Reagan Memorial Tollway near the Oakbrook Center mall, according to the Chicago Tribune. The deal is contingent on Hines getting zoning approval for its plan from local officials.

McDonald’s has hired JLL to sell its Oak Brook properties now that it’s moved operations to the city. The complex that most recently housed the actual corporate headquarters, a separate Oak Brook site on 74 acres south of the tollway, is still for sale.

On the McDonald’s Plaza site, Hines wants to building a combination of office, residential, hotel and retail space, creating a “a new village center” for Oak Brook, Hines’ Greg Van Schaack told the Tribune.

JLL brokers Scott Miller and Lindsay Fahey are representing McDonald’s on all of its Oak Brook property sales. Miller said the company and Hines are working together to determine what could go on the McDonald’s Plaza site.

“McDonald’s is really comfortable with … (Hines’) prior experience doing large mixed-use developments, their financial capacity, their track record and their reputation,” Miller told the Tribune.

In Chicago, Hines is behind the River Point office tower at 444 West Lake Street and the ongoing three-tower Wolf Point development across the river. It’s also part of the Lincoln Common project to redevelop the site of the old Children’s Memorial Hospital in Lincoln Park.

JLL continues to conduct site tours with prospective buyers of the 74-acre campus, which includes a more than 330,000-square-foot office building, a 218-room Hyatt Lodge and the 130,000 square-foot former Hamburger University building. [Chicago Tribune] — John O’Brien