Sizing up Chicago’s construction pipeline

Big projects involving James Martell, Mike Reschke and Sterling Bay crack top 10

Logistics Property's James Martell and rendering of Goose Island property (Logistics Property, Getty)

Bill Egbert

Research by

Matthew Elo

Feb 16, 2023, 10:16 AM

After no industrial projects cracked Chicago’s 10 costliest developments in 2021, a novel one landed on top of the city’s construction pipeline last year.

The total estimated cost for Chicago’s 10 largest construction projects for 2022 is just north of a billion dollars, and the top five developments were all nine-figure costs. Those figures align with the top of the market in the previous year, as well.

What’s different is that the biggest project permitted last year was by longtime industrial developer James Martell’s firm, Logistics Property, with its $162 million project at 1237 West Division Street near Goose Island. It will be Chicago’s first two-story warehouse, totaling 600,000 square feet on a plot of land the developer bought from People’s Gas Light & Coke for $55 million in May last year.

Mike Reschke’s company, The Prime Group, took the No. 2 spot among projects permitted in 2022 with the $137.5 million, 28-story, 390-key RIU Plaza Hotel Chicago at 150 East Ontario Street in Streeterville, a site that’s been vacant for more than ten years.

Next is Sterling Bay’s 24-story tower at 360 North Green Street at the northeast corner of Fulton Market. That project is expected to cost $121 million and will include 5,400 square feet of retail space and just under 500,000 square feet of Class A office space.

The fourth-biggest project on tap for the Windy City is the 375-foot, 343-unit development going up at 350 North Canal Street on the site of the Cassidy Tire building in the Fulton River District. The nearly $107.6 million project is a joint venture between Chicago developer Habitat Co. and Diversified Real Estate Capital.

LG Development Group’s 19-story mixed-use building at 210 North Aberdeen Street rounds out the top five with a price tag of $101 million. It will include 10,700 square feet of retail space and 363 apartment units.

Here are all 10 of Chicago’s biggest construction projects, ranked by the initial construction estimates included in their permit applications. The initial construction estimate for a project is often lower than its final finished cost.

This is one of the hundreds of data sets available on TRD Pro — the one-stop real estate terminal for all the data and market information you need.