Robert Steele, who holds the title "convener" of the collaborative, hailed the Homan Square venture as a "proclamation of faith" in North Lawndale. It is called the West Cluster Empowerment Zone Collaborative. In expectation that the area will eventually be a federally designated "empowerment" zone in West Chicago, of which North Lawndale will be a part, city officials have already put into place a structure to administer Federal funds. Since then there has been abandonment of housing, and especially of apartment buildings, many of which have been demolished. Many of North Lawndale's commercial buildings were burned in the riots after the assassination of the Rev. More than half the people have annual incomes under $15,000 and Chicago officials estimate that about 40 percent of the people of working age are unemployed. The population of 47,000 is less than half what it was 30 years ago. It sits astride Eisenhower Expressway, a major east-west commuting route, a 10-minute drive from downtown.īut it is a poverty zone, with a mostly black population and heavy social problems - symbolic to Chicagoans in the way that Watts became a symbol in Los Angeles or the South Bronx in New York. North Lawndale is an area of four and a half square miles that is well located from a commuting point of view. We wanted to do the right thing for the community, the right thing for the city and the right thing for Sears." "We had offers to sell the complex, several times," said Edward A. Meanwhile, the demolition of the former Sears catalogue building is under way across Arthington Street in preparation for the second phase of construction - more housing. In the rental apartments, assisted by tax-credit financing, rents will range from $385 to $490 a month. Twenty-one of the houses have been sold for occupancy in the fall. Homan Avenue is a major street running through the development, which has been named Homan Square.Ĭonstruction on the first phase, with 24 detached houses and 50 rental apartments, has already started. Sears has donated the land and will contribute an additional $30 million over time. There are to be a total of 600 housing units, built in four phases over 10 years. Some of the old Sears buildings will be rehabilitated under the redevelopment plan - the former administration building into a million square feet of commercial space.īut the principal thrust of the plan is publicly assisted residential development. The last step was the closing of its department store in 1984. ![]() The 55-acre site was the original corporate location of Sears, but a long-term withdrawal was set in motion 20 years ago. Sears, Roebuck and Company is developing the project in a joint venture partnership with the Shaw Company, headed by Charles Shaw, a Chicago builder. THE blighted and downtrodden neighborhood of North Lawndale, four miles west of downtown Chicago, has become the setting for one of the few major residential development projects under way here.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |