The area between Roosevelt Road and the Chicago River used to be reserved for business – civic or private – and living in a condo there would have been about as appealing to most Chicagoans as renting a tree house in Oswego. But after years of city investment in the Loop, a decade-long real estate boom and significant residential growth in surrounding areas, from River North to the West Loop, the Loop itself has emerged as a hot if nascent residential neighborhood.
Most residential building in the Loop has come in the form of new infill condo towers. Developments such as Modern Momentum, Waterview Tower, Astoria Tower and The Mandarin Oriental Tower, Chicago are touting their proximity to the city’s major amenities – The Art Institute, Symphony Center, Broadway in Chicago and, of course, Millennium Park. Some new projects, such as Library Tower and The Legacy at Millennium Park, highlight the Loop’s cultural capital right in their names.
The giant wave of office-to-residential conversions some predicted more than a decade ago never happened, but there have been a number of high-profile condo conversions in former, or even current, Loop office buildings. These include Metropolitan Tower and Metropolis. Century Tower already had been converted from office space to apartments several years ago and is now being converted to condominiums. The top floors of Mid-Continental Plaza, an underperforming office building at 55 E. Monroe St., are undergoing a phased condo conversion as The Park Monroe, but most of the massive building will remain offices.
More office conversions are likely in the heart of the Loop, especially near Millennium Park, but two of the most watched developments are planned communities with their own green space, retail and even roads. These “mega-projects” have the scale to be their own neighborhoods. Their developers are able to create oases within the bustle of downtown, communities that illustrate the tension between the desire to live in the center of the action and the need to escape to a private sanctuary.
When Lakeshore East is finished, 16 buildings, most of them high-rises, will stand on 28 acres between Randolph and Wacker, at the confluence of the Chicago River and Lake Michigan. This $4 billion project, on the site of a former golf course, will include 5,000 condos and apartments, about 200 hotel rooms and a retail center. Treasure Island Foods recently signed on as a tenant, says Tricia Van Horn, vice president of marketing at developer Magellan Development Group.
In January, Magellan secured financing for Aqua, the 82-story hotel, apartment and condo tower acclaimed by some as a design masterpiece. At press  time, its 264 condos were about 80 percent sold. Other active towers at Lakeshore East now include 340 on the Park and The Chandler. The Parkhomes are low-rise housing surrounding the six-acre park in the center of Lakeshore East. This focal point creates the feel of “a self-contained village on the edge of a big city,” says developer James Loewenburg, Magellan’s co-CEO and principal of Loewenberg  Architects.
The $900 million Roosevelt Collection will bring 1,000 new residences and what is essentially a high-end mall to the Loop’s southern border, on a 14-acre site bounded by the Metra tracks, Wells Street, Roosevelt Road and 9th Street. Mid-rise condo buildings with retail on the two lower levels will line a wide landscaped pedestrian boulevard. At the northern end of the site, a 40-story condo tower will sit adjacent to a two-acre park.
About 40 shops will fill the 400,000 square feet of retail space, including a 16-screen movie theater. The first phase, 342 loft-style condos, is scheduled to break ground April 1, with deliveries planned for October 2008.