Go ahead and click. You know you want to.
Loop Spy Daniel scored with a few fantastic new photos of the confluence of the Chicago River’s main and north branches. In one panorama, you can see the construction at both Wolf Point West (326 North Orleans Street) and River Point (444 West Lake Street).
Wolf Point West had its belated ceremonial groundbreaking last Friday. The tower, designed by friends-of-the-blog bKL Architecture, has been under construction for months and is even sporting a tower crane. When complete, it will be 493 feet tall across 48 stories and have 509 residences. The development of Wolf Point has been on the books since the 1970’s, but the plan only went into Lazarus mode last year. The goal is to have the first people moving into the west tower apartments by fall of 2015.
Click to embiggen.
On the other side of the Y, River Point faced a different set of challenges. Pushed through behind 42nd Ward Alderman Brendan Reilly’s back by Mayor Rahm Emanuel, Reilly was able to get one big concession out of the hybrid Texas/Canadian developers: Finish the acre-and-a-half public park first, then build your fancy office tower.
That park you can clearly see in the panoramas. It is raised quite a bit above the river’s edge because it also serves as a cap for Amtrak and Metra passenger rail tracks headed north and west.
The tower, when complete, will rise 52 stories over the Chicago River, with a gentle curve echoing the path of the river and its neighbor across the river, 333 West Wacker, which also has a facade bent in deference to the water’s edge.
Location: 444 West Lake Street, Fulton River District
