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Oct 31, 2024

Solo Cup factory site in Highland Park pitched for townhomes | Crain's Chicago Business

Dennis Rodkin is a senior reporter covering residential real estate for Crain’s Chicago Business. He joined Crain’s in 2014 and has been covering real estate in Chicago since 1991. For the third time

Dennis Rodkin is a senior reporter covering residential real estate for Crain’s Chicago Business. He joined Crain’s in 2014 and has been covering real estate in Chicago since 1991.

For the third time in six years, the long-vacant 28-acre site of a former Solo Cup factory in Highland Park is in a developer’s sights, this time for residential development that would be half as dense as a plan that dissolved in 2018.

The Habitat Co. is in the early stages of proposing a total of 262 units in townhouses and two-flats, with about 11.7 acres of existing trees and wetlands preserved on two sides of the property, which is at Old Deerfield and Ridge roads west of U.S. Highway 41.

In 2018, a different developer proposed a total of 513 units for the same site but, amid pushback from neighbors, didn’t proceed.

“We’ve learned from our past,” John Schiess, head of Oak Park architecture firm JCSA and a consultant for Habitat, said at a meeting yesterday evening with local residents.

Schiess formerly represented both the 513-unit development and a plan to build warehouses with almost four dozen truck bays that fell apart in 2023 after vehement opposition from nearby residents who said it did not belong so close to a residential area.

The latest proposal, while still in an early stage, is “a much better fit for the neighborhood and for Highland Park,” Schiess said at yesterday's meeting, which was held at a Highland Park movie theater.

Not only is it half as dense and proposing lower buildings, Schiess said, but it preserves numerous old trees, a creek and seven wetlands, while the previous residential plan “encroached” on both, he said.

An 11.2-acre L-shaped natural area on the east and south sides of the property would be protected and enhanced by environmental consultants, Schiess said, and lawns and other landscaped spaces within the development would bring the total green space to 17 acres. That’s about 59% of the site’s 28.6 acres.

One image with this story, part of yesterday’s presentation, shows the overall site plan. The other shows only the L-shaped natural area on the site’s east and south sides.

Habitat’s proposal would “change the underlying industrial zoning to a less intense and environmentally sustainable use,” Zack Zalar, Habitat’s vice president of investments, said in a statement emailed to Crain’s. He attended the meeting with residents but did not speak as part of the presentation.

As the proposal solidifies, Zalar said in the statement, it will be one that “appropriately balances the needs of the community and preserves open space, including heritage trees and wetlands, while respecting the character of the area.”

To the site’s east and north are commercial properties including offices, a police station and a restaurant. The other two sides are residential, all single-family homes. Schiess said because of the width of the proposed protected natural area, no new buildings would be closer than 100 feet to existing homes.

“In past applications, the boundary came pretty darned close to your house, if you live south of the property” on Grove Avenue, Schiess said.

The roughly three dozen residents who attended in person yesterday offered no positive or negative comments, only questions about details. Many of those details are not yet settled, according to Schiess and Katie Jahnke Dale, a commercial real estate attorney at DLA Piper who was also there to represent Habitat.

Key among the yet-undecided details is whether the residential units, a combination of three-story townhouses and two-story two-flats in about 30 low-rise buildings, would be for sale or for rent.

Also unknown: whether a fence would be built in the natural area to formally separate the development from its neighbors.

Jahnke Dale emphasized at the meeting that Habitat is still working on the plan and has not yet made a formal proposal to city officials. That process will entail going before Highland Park’s commissions on planning and housing as well as the full City Council. Until the process begins, there is no timeline for construction of the project.

Solo Cup's factory was on the site from 1960 until 2008. That’s when Solo announced it would move its headquarters to Lake Forest and about 200 of the factory’s roughly 420 manufacturing jobs to other U.S. locations.

Since 2012, the property has been owned by legal entities associated with Chicago investor Fred Eychaner, Lake County public records show. The price Eychaner paid is not clear in the records. At some point around 2015, the Solo Cup buildings on the site were demolished, leaving only a few remnants like asphalt parking lots and an entrance gate.

If Habitat’s proposal goes through, the firm will buy the site from the present owner, but no price has been made public.

Dennis Rodkin is a senior reporter covering residential real estate for Crain’s Chicago Business. He joined Crain’s in 2014 and has been covering real estate in Chicago since 1991.

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