Seems the State still wants to dump the Thompson Center and cares less on demolishing this stunning building downtown. (Marshall: city hall, hotel)

[DavePa]

Originally Posted by edsg25

Could an argument be made that the right kind of developer could take the block on which the Thompson Center sits, build his new structure and incorporate the Thompson Center and creatively integrate it into the complex and, in the process.......make a more lucrative situation for his company than what it had been with the building being torn down?

I'd say, "yes".

The options of what one could do to the Thompson Center are open ended. Thinking outside the box can come up with the right use. For example, the ideas I have read about that turns the TC into an open air, open space structure are intriguing. The building could be open from the street level, naturally ventilated and the ring of offices around it be removed.

If the city wants to have its cake (a shiny new tower, likely the tallest within the confines of the Loop) and eat it too (retaining the Thompson Center in a repurposed form), it could do so. And how much $$$$$$ could be saved by being able to retain the super station, the most complex in the CTA system, at Clark & Lake, compared to the daunting task of rebuilding it.

If Chicago wanted to retain this building, it could easily have drawn up renderings and annotation to illustrate what the TC could look like. Visually showing how the building could be repositioned.....and make a profit over it.

New York can shift Penn Station into a more welcoming and majestic terminal by taking it from out and under MSG and placing it in a vintage building where it makes a good fit. But if given a chance, would New York like the original, magnificent Penn Station to never have been torn down? Hell, yes. Even though it doesn't get a do over. Be careful what you tear down.....you may never know how much you will miss it.

Penn Station is the reason reason there is a Hudson Yards ("yards" as in rail yards, not "yards" in a fancy name for a development). And today's Hudson Yards, by far the largest scaled and most expensive multiuser project to be built in any city, would benefit greatly if the original Penn Station still stood. And if it did, it could generate a type of life, a sense of place, a humanly defined structure that would contrast greatly (and help greatly) the absolute cold sterility of the soulless Hudson Yards.

Chicago, don't let history repeat itself.

Yes yes. I'm sure you saw the rendering of a super tall WITH the Thomson Center too?

Ambitious Thompson Center reuse visualized in new renderings from Landmarks Illinois.

https://chicago.curbed.com/2018/4/26...marks-illinois

[DavePa]

Helmut Jahn's Thompson Center has been placed on the NATIONAL LIST of 11 ENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES .... yes Historic places. This could be what prevents demolition and much help in the push for LANDMARK STATUS.

https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/5/30...hompson-center

[CCrest182]

I never liked that building personally. Wouldn't at all be sad to see it go. I definitely don't see at as anything like a "treasure" or "landmark", more like a building that just makes the Loop look trashy. The reddish base of the building looks very bad IMO.

But I guess beauty really is in the eye of the beholder.

[smegmatite]

Originally Posted by DavePa

Helmut Jahn's Thompson Center has been placed on the NATIONAL LIST of 11 ENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES .... yes Historic places. This could be what prevents demolition and much help in the push for LANDMARK STATUS.

https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/5/30...hompson-center

this thing is a landmark to Illinois government alright, inefficient, expensive, everyone trying to get their fingers in the pot.. yeah

[edsg25]

Originally Posted by smegmatite

this thing is a landmark to Illinois government alright, inefficient, expensive, everyone trying to get their fingers in the pot.. yeah

Dave, of course you are right. The Thompson Center should be preserved. The Thompson Center, its atrium, offers something rare in the Loop: public space. The commons. An idea that so sadly is out of touch with the times in which we live. `The commons, it would seem apparent, is the enemy of a society where everything is monetized.

Repurpose the Thompson Center.....sure...and make the changes that make it function today but keep its integrity (as opposed to the worst type of preservation, Soldier Field, where the flying saucer landing inside of a Greek temple knocked the structure off the list of landmark status buildings.

What the Thompson Center could do is use the example of what is occurring on the west side of downtown and in the edges of the Near West Side where the old Post Office and CCH respectively work to preserve and to reuse in two striking development.

And from a developers point of view, retaining the TC could be a way of making their project more, not less, viable. And certainly they have the minds or can hire the minds to generate how the TC could be integrated into their project in a win/win situation for the developer and for the public.

With Clark Lake, the busiest and most complex super station in the CTA, wouldn't it make sense to spotlight it by retaining the atrium in which he has access in an atrium that wold become more open air.

[MSchemist80]

With all those windows it would be a perfect marijuana growing facility. Perfect timing with the legislation pending.

[jfre81]

Originally Posted by MSchemist80

With all those windows it would be a perfect marijuana growing facility. Perfect timing with the legislation pending.

Hm. Probably perfect to veg some big trees, but temperature/humidity control in flower is nigh impossible. Mold/PM/bud rot are inevitable.

[dtcbnd03]

Originally Posted by DavePa

Helmut Jahn's Thompson Center has been placed on the NATIONAL LIST of 11 ENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES .... yes Historic places. This could be what prevents demolition and much help in the push for LANDMARK STATUS.

https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/5/30...hompson-center

Tear that ugly thing down. I love architecture and history and that thing doesn't need to be saved at all....

[edsg25]

Originally Posted by DavePa

Helmut Jahn's Thompson Center has been placed on the NATIONAL LIST of 11 ENDANGERED HISTORIC PLACES .... yes Historic places. This could be what prevents demolition and much help in the push for LANDMARK STATUS.

https://chicago.curbed.com/2019/5/30...hompson-center

[edsg25]

re: repurposing the Thompson Center:

I would think that any repurposing of the Thompson Center would be to make it as open air as possible. The entrances could be open without doors and the ceiling...in one way or another....could be opened up and let air circulate. A true hybred indoor/outdoor space.

This is just brain storming of the kind of thing(s) could fill the atrium"

We're used to things in Chicago being seasonal or, more appropriately, super seasonal in the sense that, yes, summer is included as a whole, but both fall and spring make up a nice chunk of the season, too.

I speak of places like the River Walk or Buckingham Fountain.

So why not consider a farmers market that extends from, say, late March into late November (with a possible one or two week opening during the winter holiday season).

Chicago, like virtually every place, has its farmers market and what they have to offer is not something that would be in competition with, for example, Taste of Chicago. The insanity about how difficult Chicago winters are come from outsiders and IMHO are totally out of whack. This is far removed from Siberia So there is no reason why we can't look at something outdoors to be in use most of the year.

If we were really cold, that is, in the sense of Twin Cities cold, we might be getting out more....Minneapolis, to its credit, embraces winter.

The Chicago Farmers Market could have a longer than would be expected season and conceivably be up all year. The one I would put into the Thompson Center would not be "a farmers market", it would be the "Farmers Market". I could be wrong here, but the only other place whee the Farmers Market is a real location, a spot, is in Los Angeles. And without LA's year round favorable weather, Chicago's would have more limitations.

Still....it will be a draw for tourists (like it is in LA) and there might be some sense of justice in building one: If the Loop suffered (it did) from the Fields-to-Macy's conversion (yes, we lost a lot there....including a tourist attraction), then a...no....The Farmers Market gives the Loop a retail institution of note, a mere couple of blocks removed from where Marshall Field's drew them in at State and Randolph.

And swinging from LA to NY.....let's consider that the Times Square subway station is arguably the busiest with the most lines in the city....Chicago's heart of the CTA is the Clark/Lake station, the station with the most lines (brown, purple, pink, green, orange and blue), the only one in the system that unites el and subway tracks in one vertical structure and the one out of the only two (along with Roosevelt Road) that offers direct access to el and subway. So, of course, the farmers market could be tied into the location of a major rail station.

within the confines of the open air TC atrium, Couldn't a new food hall be placed....enclosed with a glass roof to enhance this food laden development. And since competition is often great for sales (both Fields and Carsons benefitted from their block away locations on State), couldn't those we are interested in food shopping in a fun way link the TC market with the Metra Market (French Market) a few blocks to the west. It could be another win/win situation.

Just an idea, just brain storming here....but I could see it work

And if one really wants to think out-of-the-box: let's imagine that the aerial gondola system proposed for the south bank of the riverfront with its start at Navy Pier were to become a reality (pipe dream, I realize, but just imagining): How would a route from the Pier, west over the River Walk to, say, Franklin where it would head south for a block and make another turn east on Lake to the Thompson Center (right above the elevated platform) while then making a left on Dearborn for another block stretch than meeting up with the riverfront line by going east over Wacker.

My whole point here is this: we CAN and we SHOULD do the brainstorming to think of ways to make the preservation and the new tower next door a win/win situation.

Another thing: I think it is fairly irrelevant if you either like or dislike the Thompson Center....the push for landmark status says a building is part of our heritage. It is also, as noted, about the commons, which sadly in Chicago and across the nation have become pretty uncommon places. Civic space loses so much in this era that everything is monetized.