If you ever get to go to a Cubs game again, you’ll find that the tradition of staggering from the bleachers to the Taco Bell across the street is over. The Taco Bell is gone. In its place a new four-story commercial building is rising on the corner of Addison and the space that used to be the Chicago and Evanston Railroad.
Wrigleyville Spy Joel pitched this construction photo of 1111 West Addison into our tip line.
The four-story building is from Summit Design+Build and Hirsch MPG. It is expected to have three retailers on the ground floor, and one retailer in the other three floors — a gym. It will be 65 feet tall, with 56,000 square feet of space.
Hard core Cubs fans, and those into old Chicago photographs, may remember that there use to be a coaling station next to Wrigley Field, and the former railroad right-of-way next to this new building served that facility on Seminary Avenue. It was part of the old Chicago and Evanston Railroad’s Lakewood branch line, and allowed office workers in The Loop to take a train from what is now Ogilvie Station directly to Wrigley Field. In addition to coal, the line was known for linking a number of candy factories back in the days when Chicago was the king of confections in America.
As the north side became less industrial over the years, the rails were used less and less. The coal yard was torn down in 1961, and freight stopped running up this far in the 1970’s.
Location: 1111 West Addison Street, Wrigleyville
Editor founded the Chicago Architecture Blog in 2003, after a long career in journalism. He can be reached at chicagoarchitectureinfo@gmail.com.
