Lincoln Yards site is poised for new chapter, but debate over what went wrong with the stalled project continues
The war of words over what went wrong with developer Sterling Bay's grand vision for its Lincoln Yards development on the North Side continues, even while the city waits to see what will happen with the sprawling site.
Former Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot recently fired back at Sterling Bay, saying company leadership blamed their project's failure to launch on her one-term administration.
Axios reporter Justin Kaufmann interviewed Lightfoot in May at the Hideout, a music club adjacent to the 53-acre site, and asked her about Sterling Bay's failure to build the controversial Lincoln Yards project. She ripped company CEO Andy Gloor for having 'repeatedly lied about me in public,' blaming her administration for the development's lack of progress.
'The truth is, I think they never actually had the financing to pull the deal off,' Lightfoot said. 'I don't think they ever had it.'
Sterling Bay says financing the project was possible.
'The financing mechanism and the capital partners were in place before she took office, with the largest core fund in the country as Lincoln Yards' partner,' a Sterling Bay spokesperson said Friday.
Sterling Bay gave up control of Lincoln Yards' northern half earlier this year to its lender Bank OZK. Chicago-based residential developer JDL Development is negotiating to take over both the northern and southern halves of the nearly vacant megadevelopment site.
Gloor first spoke out as Lightfoot was leaving office in 2023. He said her administration was slow in issuing needed approvals, setting the project — which originally called for thousands of apartments and offices, including skyscrapers of up to 600 feet, riverfront parks and a life sciences complex — back by several years.
'She fought the development, which is so puzzling to me because the economic impact in terms of construction jobs, permanent jobs and the ability to compete with some other cities,' he said, according to Bloomberg. 'It's in the $8 to $10 billion if you add it all up.'
Sterling Bay began buying up properties along the North Branch of the Chicago River between North Avenue and Webster Avenue about 10 years ago. City Council approved the developer's vision in 2019, including the creation of a tax increment financing district, just as former Mayor Rahm Emanuel was leaving office.
The approval sparked outrage among some community activists, who complained the plan would funnel hundreds of millions of tax dollars from city coffers to Sterling Bay. But the company said it would have needed to spend nearly $500 million upfront reconstructing neighborhood bridges, roads and the riverfront before getting reimbursed by the city.
Lightfoot told Kaufmann that she had dropped her objections to Emanuel's 2019 deal with Sterling Bay in exchange for some modest changes. But in the first few weeks of her administration, Sterling Bay 'came back to us and said, 'You know, we actually need a billion more dollars. Will you agree to that?' Not surprisingly I said, 'You're out of your effing mind.''
'To say we ever asked her for 'a billion more dollars' is patently false,' the Sterling Bay spokesperson said.
Sterling Bay's 2019 redevelopment agreement with the city anticipated using a special service area to help fund the needed infrastructure at Lincoln Yards. These local taxing districts are used in many neighborhoods to fund improvements such as landscaping, cleanups and added security services, but Lightfoot objected to using an SSA for extensive infrastructure work.
'Unfortunately, former Mayor Lightfoot is celebrating hundreds of millions of dollars in investor losses and billions more in economic opportunity lost under her watch,' the Sterling Bay spokesperson added. 'That is her legacy.'
The pandemic and a slump in the office market, followed by soaring interest rates, made it even more difficult to secure development financing. Sterling Bay did manage to complete one building, an eight-story structure dedicated to life sciences that stands alone at 1229 W. Concord Place, but its 300,000 square feet of lab space has been empty since construction wrapped up in 2023.
Lightfoot told Kaufmann that vacancy shows the problems with Lincoln Yards went deep, and had nothing to do with her.
'You've got a high-rise building over here that was supposed to be a new life sciences building that doesn't have one tenant,' she said. 'They're liars. They never had the money.'
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