If you think riding the Red Line north at noon on a Friday when the Cubs are playing is a tight squeeze, you should see what they’re doing down at 66 East Wacker Place.
That’s where GDS Companies has construction crews trying to put up a Hilton Garden Inn in a space that we used to think was just a narrow back alley, but turns out to be just the right size for a 26-story hotel, according to the plans drawn up by GREC Architects.
The limited service hotel is being wedged into the space between the 17th Church of Christ, the Chicago Motor Club Building, and the Wyndham that used to be Hotel 71. Think of it as trying to fit a giant wooden blue tetrahedron block into a rhomboid hole.
Regardless of the impossibility of the task, as demonstrated by any PlaySkool motor skills test, Loop Spy Ryan tells us construction crews are plugging away, and with all kinds of noisy machines are making progress on the project. He texted us the photo above. GDS hopes to have the new hotel open by this time next year.
