Skokie Trustees To Review Plans For Hundreds of Apartments, Hotel at Westfield Old Orchard
SKOKIE, IL — Village trustees are set to grant preliminary approval Tuesday to the first phase of a multi-year redevelopment plan to build hundreds of apartments and a hotel at Westfield Old Orchard Mall, reshaping the future of the village’s primary sales tax generator.
Developers have agreed to set aside 3.5 percent of the units in each of the project’s two phases for residents earning between 60 and 80 percent of the area median income for at least 25 years.
That comes out to 15 units out of the 425 planned in the first phase and nine from the second phase — with more if the hotel plans are replaced with additional housing units.
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The multimillion-dollar project follows the village board’s 2022 decision to designate Old Orchard as a business district and establish a new tax to fund its redevelopment.
The owner of Old Orchard, Paris-based mall landlord Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, has partnered with Chicago-based Focus Development on the redevelopment plans.
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Justin Pelej, Focus’ executive vice president for development, said his firm has so far only signed on for the first phase of the project, which would not be complete for about three years.
“Our intent would be to get approvals here and then we work into actual working drawings for a permit and so on, get financing, et cetera,” Pelej told plan commissioners.
“So, at this point, I think a reasonable assumption would be a construction start sometime second, third quarter of next year,” he said. “And then from that point it would be 27 months.”
The first phase of the project includes tearing down the former Bloomingdale’s building and replacing it with two mixed-use buildings — a five-story one on the north and a seven-story one on the south — that will include more than 400 residential apartments and 16,000 square feet of restaurant and retail space.
A new public common area and event space designed to revitalize the northwest corner of the mall is also planned.
Phase two involves the demolition of existing retail space at the north end of Old Orchard. Developers plan to build a seven-story mixed-use building with 250 residential units, more retail and restaurant spaces and a parking garage.
Another eight-story building is also planned, which will include either a 200-key hotel or up to 125 additional residential units.
“I think we would want to certainly execute on phase one and see how it’s going before we would commit to any sort of schedule on phase two, because it may dictate some changes,” Pelej said.
Stephen Fluhr, senior vice president of development at URW, said company officials strongly preferred to build a hotel, citing its benefit to the “cross shopping experience” and “dwell experience” of the shopping center.
“They see the power of the place creation that we are doing,” Fluhr said.
“It can become a draw in an of itself. That said, if the macroeconomic environment doesn’t allow for it at the time — or there simply isn’t a deal in the hotel world — we have put in the application a conversation rate to 125 multi-family units for the site,” he told plan commissioners. “The reality is, if there’s changes to the plan, we’re going to back in front of this board.”
Fluhr said company officials had a multiphase plan to relocate Barnes and Noble, which have to be moved for the first phase, and the Cheesecake Factory, which would be relocated for the second phase.
The Skokie Plan Commission approved the site plan on Aug. 15, and the village’s appearance commission issued it a certificate of appropriateness two weeks later.
On Tuesday, the Skokie Village Board will consider the first reading of the proposed plans, with a second reading to be scheduled at a future meeting.
Earlier: $100 Million Transformation Of Old Orchard Mall Heads To Skokie Plan Commission
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