So Long and Thanks, NEMA Tower Crane
It’s been some time since the first of two new residential towers topped off on the corner of Roosevelt and Indiana. And during the construction, standing there silently in a supporting role, there was the tower crane that made it all possible. It may have been silent because it doesn’t have a mouth, or lungs, or sarcasm. Or it may have been silent because it simply didn’t speak our language. NEMA Chicago under...
The View From Grant Park Keeps A-Changin’
If you’ve gone to a festival, played softball, or just walked around Grant Park in the last decade or so, you’ve been a first-hand witness to the changing of Chicago’s skyline. 340 On The Park, The Legacy, Heritage At Millennium Park, Roosevelt University’s Wabash Building, Trump International Hotel and Tower, and the 300 East Randolph vertical expansion all added drama to the park border. Chicago skyline...
Chicago Harbors Already Getting Ready for Summer
It’s officially spring, but you’d never know it around here. While we’re still freezing our Vienna Sausages off, preparations are already underway for the summer boating season. Chicago Harbors is busy with the first of three phases of a seven million dollar renovation across the city’s 6,000-slip harbor network, which is supposed to be the largest in the world, if you believe Wikipedia. Burnham Harbor dock...
Chicago’s NEMA is Way Better Than San Francisco’s NEMA
If you spent New Year’s Eve with your eyes pointed at the sky enjoying the neighborhood’s totally-illegal-but-the-cops-don’t-care fireworks display, you may have noticed a little something special in the South Loop. That special thing is NEMA Chicago (1200 South Indiana Avenue), the skyscraper growing on the southern edge of Grant Park. Joe Zekas at YoChicago! sent in the photograph above showing the upper reaches...
Up High in the South Loop: NEMA Towers Over All
In 29 days, Santa comes to town, and the fat old elf will have a few more obstacles to navigate his sleigh around. Among them is NEMA Chicago, the 76-story residential tower going up on the south end of Grant Park — one of Mr. Claus’ favorite landing areas. I need an oxygen tank and a lurpy dog with a barrel of brandy around his neck to climb the Montrose Harbor sledding hill, but Joe Zekas from YoChicago! hitched up his...
A Little Skyscraper Abracadabra Along Grant Park
Sometimes the monotony of life becomes a way of life. Keep your head down. Stay off the boss’ radar. Don’t attract attention. But keeping our heads down, while a common survival skill, prevents us from seeing the marvels the city of Chicago serves up around us every day. You don’t need Cher to give you a wet slap across the face to snap out of it. Just look at the animation below. Joe Zekas of YoChicago! sent...
Construction Update Two-Fer: Vista and Bennett
As Chicago’s skyline transforms itself once again, it’s easy to get a little crick in your neck looking up all the time. So, instead it’s better to look out. As in this view looking out from NEMA Chicago, taken by Joe Zekas of YoChicago! last week. It shows the progress of the Vista Tower in Lakeshore East in the foreground, with One Bennett Park in Streeterville in the background. Unlike most cities which have a...
Building NEMA: A Day in the Life of a Chicago Skyscraper Construction Worker
If you’ve been following the construction of NEMA Chicago (formerly One Grant Park, formerly 113 East Roosevelt), or any other skyscraper under construction in Chicago, you’ve probably wondered what it’s like “up there.” Open House Chicago notwithstanding, few people get to go up to the top of the city’s skyscrapers. Even fewer get to do it while the structures are still under construction. Joe...
