For more than a century, the property bounded by Sedgwick Street and Armitage, Dickens and Lincoln avenues was dedicated to health care.
First known as The Deaconess Institute of the Swedish Evangelical Lutheran Church in 1884, then renamed Augustana Hospital in 1924 and finally dubbed Lutheran General Hospital-Lincoln Park in 1987, the institution saw good times and bad, anchoring the neighborhood even as the community around it evolved.
But today a new prescription is being written for the site.
The venerable hospital is being replaced by upscale housing, joining in the gentrification that has remade the blighted post-World War II Lincoln Park of neglected residences into a more affluent community of renovated brick buildings, elegant graystones and sleek high-rises.
When Lutheran General-Lincoln Park Hospital shuttered its doors in December 1989, a for sale sign was posted on the five-acre property. The property attracted considerable interest in the real estate community, touching off a three year scramble over the redevelopment of the site.
The land attracted so much attention because of its size and premier location: “Lincoln Park is one of the most desirable neighborhoods in the city,” said Ed Marciniak, president of the Institute of Urban Life at Loyola University.
“If you’re not talking about lakefront property, it’s the cream of the crop on the North Side . . . it’s what Hyde Park used to be,” said the urbanologist.
Although the Hassinger Cos. was selected for the project shortly after the 1989 sale was announced, the Arlington Heights-based firm could not find financing and was forced to abandon its plans. The parcel went back on the block last January.
Some 18 firms took a “good hard look” at the property on this second go-round, with six submitting final bids, said Vann Avedisian, a vice president at LaSalle Partners, marketing agents for Lutheran General HealthSystem.
During the boom days of development, six bidders would have been considered an average turnout, but in today’s climate of tight-fisted financing, this was a strong showing, said experts.
“There are no large parcels around; to assemble a large parcel in a primary area is almost impossible,” said Michael L. Supera, a principal of S&Z Development Co., which was among the bidders.
MCL Properties, headed by Dan McLean, emerged victorious in the bidding wars. McLean’s development, The Pointe at Lincoln Park, will feature 154 townhouses when completed. A preview ceremony is set for Tuesday at the site.
Construction is slated to begin later this fall, after the existing hospital buildings are demolished, said McLean. The project will be conducted in two phases, starting with 98 townhouses on the east side that are to be ready for initial occupancy next spring.
Work on the remaining 56 townhouses on the west side will probably begin at the end of 1994, said McLean.
In the end, the selection of McLean, developer of other in-city projects such as the Embassy Club and Burnham Place at Central Station-which will be Mayor Richard M. Daley’s new home-turned on subtle rather than dramatic differences in the various proposals.
All bidders submitted plans that were primarily residential, said Avedisian. Of the six, one involved a renovation, three called for a mix of buildings (including either mid-rise and single-family houses or mid-rise and townhouses) and the remaining two-including MCL-consisted exclusively of townhouses.
The final sales price was not disclosed. However, the six bids were all “in the same ballpark,” according to Kevin Wardell, executive vice president and chief operating officer at Lutheran General HealthSystems. (Sources estimated these bids to be in the $9 million to $9.5 million range.)
McLean’s firm was awarded the contract based on “price, ability to bring the project to fruition and acceptability to the community,” said Wardell.
The Pointe at Lincoln Park will reach no higher than four levels, which is less dense than what Hassinger planned to build (25 single-family homes, 110 condominiums in a nine-story building and 75 duplex homes.)
“There’s enough congestion,” said McLean, noting the neighborhood “doesn’t need any more high-rises or commercial development along Lincoln Avenue.”
This sentiment undoubtedly found favor with community groups. Indeed, Hassinger’s condo building was originally planned to be 18 stories, but was cut in half after neighborhood organizations protested.
“We didn’t want a structure that would be `non-neighborhood friendly,’ ” said Marcie Johnson, a neighborhood resident and member of a community oversight committee made up of the Mid-North Association, Lincoln Central and Old Town Triangle Association neighborhood groups.
“We wanted it to be part of the community and blend in with architecture of the neighborhood,” said Johnson.
MCL’s plan was “one of the least dense and most open,” said Avedisian, another detail that should please community groups who feared the new development could become a walled fortress.
McLean plans to leave the parking garage at the site open until phase II begins, when it will be demolished.
If Atlantis Properties, another bidder, had won, the existing parking garage (located on the west side) would have remained intact, providing spaces for both residents and their guests in lieu of townhouses with garages.
Attached garages are nice, said Howard Robinson, president of Atlantis, “but how does someone visit you?” The advantage to townhouses without garages would have been “more house . . . including English basements.”
And one of Robinson’s hallmarks is to build enclaves with courtyards where the main architectural detail faces inward: “I always make projects so people living in them get to see it,” Robinson said.
Yet this might have worked against Atlantis, critics said. In citing the merits of McLean’s proposal, Avedisian said: “Dan’s plan was unique in that a lot of units looked out at the streets.”
The Argent Group was the only bidder that wanted to renovate the hospital buildings. Mark Matthews, a principal of Argent Group, planned to apply for historic designation, which would have frozen property taxes for condo unit owners for an eight-year period, meaning taxes would have been “negligible” during that time, he said.
Matthews would have created 134 condo units in the buildings, adding a new condo mid-rise with 30 units and building 46 townhouses. Townhouses would have had attached garages and there would have been underground parking for condo owners located beneath the townhouses, which would have been similar to Hudson Mews, a project Matthews’ firm developed in Old Town.
The Argent Group also planned to retain the existing parking garage, although it would have been scaled back with some space converted into retail.
“I felt the west side was more suited for commercial,” said Matthews. “I had questions about its viability and attractiveness as residential property.”
Indeed, one of the first plans from S&Z Development Co., led by Supera and partner Richard Zisook, would have put 208 townhouses on the site-146 on the east side and 62 on the west side.
Yet S&Z’s final plan was scaled back to 70 townhouses on just the east side, with three-level residences that would have ranged from 2,000 to 2,600 square feet, according to Michael Gelick, architect for the project.
Losers bowed out gracefully, giving McLean’s project kudos: “They look like they’ll be nice,” said Supera, studying renderings of The Pointe at Lincoln Park. “He’s a very experienced developer . . . It should be a success.”
When completed, The Pointe at Lincoln Park will feature three variations of townhouses:
– 106 terrace homes ranging in size from 1,500 to 2,500 square feet and priced from $225,000 to $325,000.
– 38 townhomes ranging from 3,500 to 5,000 square feet and priced from $400,000 to $600,000.
– 10 coach homes averaging 3,000 square feet and priced at about $450,000.
“The project won’t change the neighborhood,” said Roy H. Kruse, whose architectural firm is designing The Pointe at Lincoln Park. “It will complement the neighborhood and blend in with existing homes.”
That means no steel, no stucco. The brick and limestone townhouses will feature “traditionally classic” design and details including columned entry porticoes, diamond point medallions, copper roofs, and even a few belvederes.
Grounds will be “very landscaped,” with pedestrian walkways that will allow people to wander through the project, added Kruse.
“(McLean) has pulled off some projects that looked risky to others-and made them successful,” said Matthews. “He’s one of the good guys out there.”
Matthews’ only concern was that there may be too many units priced above $450,000, at least in the beginning.
Phase I of The Pointe consists of 58 homes priced at $225,000 to $325,000, 34 ranging from $400,000 to $600,000 and six tagged at about $450,000.
“The value is there for what he’s building,” said Matthews, yet he questioned the “depth of the marketplace for homes exceeding $450,000,” pointing to other projects at this price level going up around the city.
The Argent Group’s plan called for “a preponderance of units in the $200,000 to $250,000 range,” and Matthews believes that “absorption would have been faster.”
Plus, Lutheran General HealthSystems would have been spared the $1.5 million cost of demolishing the building.
Yet some of Matthews’ critics said existing buildings were not architecturally significant enough to preserve. Matthews disagreed.
“They have the inability to look beyond the years of neglect and the exterior modifications that were made,” said Matthews, noting that the original buildings featured a lot of terra cotta, which, when “steam-cleaned and tuckpointed, is magnificient.”
“It wasn’t trend-setting in terms of architectural significance, but it had a lot of nice details,” said John Lahey, partner with Solomon Cordwell Buenz & Associates, which drew up the architectural plans for Matthews.
And mixing an old building with new ones would have worked well, said Lahey. “And that’s what Lincoln Park is all about . . . mixing old and new.”
