The city of Chicago has announced plans to convert a collection of empty office buildings in the city's downtown into mixed-used and residential towers.
The initiative, called LaSalle Street Reimagined, would convert nearly 2.3 million square feet (213,676 square metres) of vacant office buildings into residences and retail in the centre of Chicago, an area known as The Loop.
The plan incentivises developers to make the conversions and locally owned businesses through grants to inhabit vacant storefronts, building lobbies and former banking floors ? while incorporating housing into the towers above.
Revitalising "monoculture of offices"
According to the city, at least 30 per cent of each proposed residential conversion will be dedicated to affordable housing ? approximately 600 homes. The city defines affordable housing as residences affordable to "residents earning an average 60 per cent of the area median income". "Based on multiple studies and reports, LaSalle's future can be maximized on behalf of the entire city by revitalising its monoculture of offices with a mix of new uses and public amenities that extend beyond the typical 9-to-5 workday," said the city.
The city said that it is providing "assistance" to developers who undertake these projects under the initiative and that "almost $1 billion in total investments" are being put towards the redevelopment.
Five of these adaptive reuse projects have already been put fo...