McKinley Park and Avondale are on their way to seeing more housing.
The Chicago Plan Commission on Thursday approved development proposals that would bring a total of 313 units to those West Side neighborhoods.
A real estate venture led by Chicago investor Kin Kuong Chong and real estate agent Sharon Wong plans to turn a vacant warehouse in McKinley Park into apartments and a handful of townhomes. That development team also is behind another McKinley Park project, Archer Center Condos.
The site of the new venture, at 3301-15 S. Justine St. is flanked by residential and commercial buildings. Directly south is a Pepsi warehouse; to the west are single-family homes and two-flats.
The development team altered its design from two retail buildings and three multifamily buildings to a plan featuring more landscaping, townhomes and shorter condo buildings. Nine townhomes were added along Justine Street as a buffer between the taller residential buildings on the eastern portion of the site and the homes on the other side of Justine Street, Ben Kennedy, partner at Kennedy Mann the project’s architect, said. The tallest building will be nine stories.
“We realized there was a different direction that was much more fitting within the neighborhood,” Kennedy said.
The project still has one single-story retail building with an unknown tenant. Two residential buildings will have a combined 199 condos, in addition to the nine townhomes.
The affordable units on-site will be for sale, rather than for rent. The team didn’t disclose the average area median income for the units, but 20% of them will be priced for lower-income buyers. Condos will range from one- to three-bedroom units.
Each townhome will be about 2,400 square feet, Kennedy said.
The proposal received support from the McKinley Park Development Council, which praised the development’s relative affordability in a letter to the plan commission.
“This welcome proposal for starter homes — including desperately needed family-sized housing — stands in stark contrast to the McMansions built in McKinley Park in latter years, which have been out of reach for our existing demographics and have decreased housing density, threatening displacement,” the letter stated. “Furthermore, this is the first proposal we have seen in a long time proposing large scale, reasonably priced housing without public subsidy.”
Also approved were new townhomes and apartments in Avondale.
A venture led by Macon Construction Group and Stocking Urban is proposing 40 three-story townhomes and a five-story building with 65 apartments on a vacant lot at 3231-65 N. California Ave.
The project, a roughly $65 million investment, would start with the apartment building. The second and third phases would deliver the townhomes and parking.
The townhomes would be three stories, with three to four bedrooms each, according to the development team. Each home would have a private yard.
The apartments range from one- to four-bedroom units, with 21 of those affordable, including many family-sized units. There also will be a roof deck for residents.
If approved by the City Council, the developers estimate completion at the beginning of 2027.