Water, water everywhere. In real estate developments all over the Chicago area, water is cascading, flowing, rippling, reflecting-and selling.
Selling? Yes, developers of residential and commmercial projects have been increasingly cashing in on the ambience of water. They say it helps in selling homes, leasing office parks, improving employees` morale, creating a positive image and beautifying.
”Developments with water sell better than those without,” said housing market analyst Tracy Cross, president of Northfield-based Tracy Cross & Associates.
Cross noted, though, that water features are increasing-not because of demand by home buyers-but rather because of wetland legislation that forces developers to provide for storm-water storage on the property.
He added that water features at a subdivision entrance can enhance the image of the community, and lots bordering water command a premium of about 10 percent.
”Water is a great focal point for a development,” said Mark Kurensky, landscape architect with Schaumburg-based Otis Associates Inc. ”People like looking at water. Like a fire, it`s fascinating and ever-changing.”
Kurensky noted, though, that the recession has slowed the flood of new water features. He said the cost of a small fountain may be only $3,000 to $5,000, but large installations with pumps and landscaping can run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars.
”Water features are still being installed at special niche projects and upper-end residential developments, but not as much in the affordable home market,” he said.
One exception is a builder in the southwest suburbs who believes that creating a lake will turn his project into a success. Angelo Kleronomos, president of Woodridge-based Property Concepts Inc., had a problem: About a quarter of his 100-acre tract in Oswego was covered with an unbuildable wetland.
”But a wetland doesn`t have to be a detriment. We turned a possible liability into an asset by digging a 14-acre lake, plus adding an adjacent park,” Kleronomos said.
Model homes are scheduled to open this month at his project, Lakeview Estates, which will consist of 148 single-family homes and 62 duplexes, priced from $112,000 to $149,900. ”The lake and the park will sell this subdivision,” Kleronomos predicted.
Water is a powerful force in office developments, too.
”People prefer to be at a project with a water feature,” said Jim Dorsey, senior vice president of Koll Management Services, the agent for Cabot, Cabot & Forbes, developer of 233-acre Conway Park in Lake Forest.
The office park, which is more than half developed, has four lakes and one more is planned. Dorsey listed other benefits of water: ”It`s peaceful, dramatic and doesn`t have to be mowed.”
Mary Knowland, property manager at Conway Park, added that the tranquil effect of water ”makes people enjoy coming to work. Water has been a big selling point here.”
Still, while turning on the water can be profitable, it is also expensive. ”We`ve spent a fortune on the water at Conway Park,” Dorsey noted.
In most cases, manmade water features are an improvement over those created by Mother Nature.
Ponds in the wild can be stagnant, algae-clogged mosquito breeders. Water engineers attack that problem in a variety of ways. One method is aereation, which uses bubblers and sprays to keep the water moving. In addition, ponds are often stocked with fish that eat algae.
The latest trend involves creating a new version of ”Swan Lake.” Swans, which eat algae as well as fast-growing water plants, are being used at residential and office projects.
A pair of swans was purchased last year for the four-acre lake next to the Moore Business Forms headquarters at Conway Park.
”Most people like swans. They`re beautiful birds,” said Terry Ciochocki, customer service representative for Lombard-based Church Landscape, which manages the swans for Moore Business Forms.
Bruce Church, president of Church Landscape, said his firm is managing three swan lakes and four more are in the offing.
”Water features are becoming more popular because of mandatory water retention requirements. But instead of hiding the water, developers make it more visible and turn it into a positive benefit by adding fountains, waterfalls and flowers around the ponds. A lot of commercial sites have grass and trees, but water gives a distinctive image,” Church said.
”We built an onshore feeder and an island platform for the swans at Moore Business Forms,” Ciochocki said. Besides their aesthetic appeal, swans also chase the geese away, she said.
Roswell Van Deusen, who supplies swans for Church Landscape, explained the geese problem: ”There are a lot of non-migratory geese in the Chicago area. Their droppings and feathers create a nuisance. Swans, which are very territorial, will drive off the geese.”
Van Deusen, owner of Pitchfork Valley Farm in Delton, Mich., added that
”swans make a body of water come alive.”
Swans may or may not be in the future for Conway Park`s newest office building, the 102,000-square-foot headquarters of Brunswick Corp., expected to be ready for occupancy next spring. On the north side of Illinois Highway 60, the structure is fronted by a lake.
”One reason Brunswick wanted the water feature was because they are in the boat business,” Dorsey said. ”The building seems to rise out of the pond. Its reflections in the water enhance the architecture.”
Residential uses of water can be just as impressive. At Property Concepts` Lakeview Estates, builder Kleronomos said he spent $1.2 million sculpting the land for his new lake. ”We dug down to bedrock and removed 170,000 cubic yards of earth,” he said.
When completed, Kleronomos will have turned a third of his 100 acres into a nature area. Besides the lake (with a maximum depth of 14 feet), the park area will include walking trails and 150 species of grasses and wildflowers.
Kleronomos will donate the parkland to the Oswego Park District, which will manage it.
”The lake, which we`ll stock with bass, is an active body of water, flowing into a creek and then into the Fox River,” he said.
So the lake will have the proper type of vegetation, it will be
”inoculated” with 10 gallons of mud from Nelson Lake in Kane County.
Before he was able to enhance nature, it took Kleronomos 16 months to get approval from the Army Corps of Engineers and eight other governmental agencies.
True to its name, Lakeview Estates will have 22 homes with lake views and 19 more next to the creek that winds through the property.
”This is going to be the prettiest subdivision in the Oswego area,”
said Herschel Luckinbill, a 13-year Oswego resident and member of the Oswego Planning Commission. He and his wife, Eva, were the first buyers at Lakeview Estates. ”We`ll jog around the lake and fish a bit,” he said.
Other buyers include Dr. Walter Kelleher, a Naperville physician, and his wife, Terry. They bought a lakefront ranch with a walkout basement. ”I`ll enjoy the view, being on the water,” he said.
The single-family homes at Lakeview Estates are priced from $137,900 to $149,900 and are 1,625 to 1,983 square feet. The duplexes, priced from $112,000 to $121,900, offer 1,344 to 1,622 square feet.
Sometimes nature needs a hand. A brook running through a residential project, office campus or golf course may look natural, but chances are there has been human engineering behind it.
”That doesn`t mean it`s any less natural, it`s just improved to maximize its potential,” said Don Jorgenson, a project director for the Brickman Group Ltd. of Long Grove.
”Regardless of how wide or deep the waterway is or how much flows through it, waterscaping can improve the site and improve the water as well,” Jorgenson said.
As an example, one of Brickman`s recent projects was the new Merit Club, a golf-course community in far north suburban Gurnee. Boulder outcroppings were added to a creek to form cascades, and ponds of calm water and pedestrian bridges were included in the plan.
To combat erosion in the creek bed, Brickman used a fiberglass matting with various sizes of stone layered on top of it. ”This is especially helpful in situations when there isn`t enough water to keep a creek flowing consistently; the dry creek bed can be just as attractive with only the stones visible,” Jorgenson said.
However, that won`t be the case at the Merit Club, where a recirculation system has been installed that pumps water back to the upper pond to keep the water moving when there is no natural flow.
”I think there`s a perception that water is being used and wasted, but it`s not. There`s no faucet running in these situations. Water is not going down the sewer. It`s coming from nature and returning to nature; we`re just helping it along,” he said.
Feryl Waldenmyer, senior project director for Brickman, said the use of water features is ”definitely increasing, both for individual residences and for larger projects, which use ponds and waterfalls at the entrances as attention-getters.”
Waldenmyer said water is an amenity that becomes a marketing tool because many home buyers like living in subdivisions with water features.
The Merit Club`s 322-acre private golf course opened in July. The residential part of the development, The Reserve at the Merit Club, will be built on 100 acres on the course. In the first phase, 38 single-family homes are planned. The ranch and two-story plans will have 2,700 to 3,880 square feet. Shaw Homes is the builder.
Water mania has even spread to apartment complexes. At the Covington, a rental development in Lombard, landscape architect Gary Weber converted a long, narrow detention pond into a canal reminiscent of Venice.
Gary R. Weber Associates Inc., a Wheaton-based landscape architecture and site-planning firm, revised the original site plan to include a canal, 600 feet long and 24 to 40 feet wide, that flows throughout the apartment complex, in many cases right outside the doorways of units.
”You almost say to yourself, `Where are the gondolas?”` said Weber.
