* Landmarks Illinois has again placed the Thompson Center on its endangered list. This time, it is proposing an alternative…

In conjunction with its annual list of endangered buildings, Landmarks Illinois has released a series of renderings that reimagines Helmut Jahn’s James R. Thompson Center with enhanced public space, while playing up its potential for adaptive re-use with an addition of a super tower.

* Here it is…

* The proposal…

o Two-story entrance bays at the plaza would be removed to create open connections between the outside and the voluminous atrium to become a truly public space.

o The ground floor and upper office floors would be enclosed to separate private office and retail spaces from the public, open-air atrium.

o The lower-level food hall could be enclosed or fitted with retractable glass partitions.

o Retail space would be expanded and café dining areas and seasonal food markets could be accommodated in the plaza and open atrium.

o Additional seating, landscaping and public art would be encouraged in the open atrium.

o The current elevator tower to upper office floors would be enclosed and secured with a new office lobby, while the hotel and residential lobbies would be located within the new tower.

o The southwest corner is the best location for a new tower with minimal impact to the building’s significant atrium space.

o A new tower, with a footprint of approximately 13,000 square feet, is developed on the southwest corner with hotel uses on the lower floors and residential on the upper floors.

o Thompson Center’s second level would connect to the tower’s second floor hotel lobby. Hotel meeting facilities would be incorporated into levels 3 and 4 of the Thompson Center.

o The remainder of the existing Thompson Center floors would be utilized as office and tech space.

* The Question: What do you think of this idea? Make sure to explain.

       

41 Comments - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 2:51 pm: Drawings can make almost anything beautiful. This bldg was junk from the “git go”. I have been there often and know many who work there. Without exception the ones I know that work there do not like it at all (that’s putting it mildly so not to get censored or banned). - 47th Ward - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 2:51 pm: It almost looks like a dagger, stabbing into the heart of state government. Also, would they replace the dingy, worn out carpet and broken furniture? Finally, seems like it would be impossible to conduct public business here during the renovation, so we’re still in need of temporary space. Other than that, and what I assume will be an astronomical price tag, this looks like a great idea. - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 2:53 pm: I commented and it did not post. Will try once more. Drawings can make almost anything look beautiful. I know many who have worked there and without exception, they dislike the bldg. - Yup! - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 2:53 pm: The Thompson Center should never have been built in the first place. The building very poorly utilizes the real estate it sits on, with the large atrium. The atrium is always described as being the buildings greatest attribute, but I find it to be most glaring problem. It needs to be torn down, while finding a way to keep the L intact. - VanillaMan - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:00 pm: LOL Sorry Big Jim, but it has to go. - SW - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:00 pm: This building was a loser from the beginning. What a waste of prime real estate. Adding a bow is not going to change things. - VanillaMan - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:02 pm: It’s the AMC Pacer of government building. - NIU Grad - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:03 pm: This is one of those situations where the building is endangered for a reason… - City Zen - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:09 pm: It’s a unique space that will, for better or worse, probably never be duplicated in such a scale. Who’s going to develop such a large space that cores out so much rent-able square footage? I’m for re-purposing it. - Northside - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:10 pm: Hard to believe, but that looks even worse; like the Thompson Center has a vertical tumor. A strong contender for James Howard Kunstler’s Eyesore of the Month. - Griffin - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:10 pm: It looks like the super tower has some type of non-benign growth that likely needs to be excised. A valiant effort to justify the continued existence of this monstrosity and to protect HJ’s pride. If you’re going to waste all of that vertical space by shoving the super tower into a corner, then just tear JRTC down and come up with a creative use of that part of the footprint as a public space. A public space that is not Daley Plaza part II. - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:10 pm: Horrible building. Disappointed it was not sold. - Oswego Willy - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:16 pm: Here’s a horrible reality to any project, renovation, sale, whatever, when discussing options for the JRTC… Look back at Block 37. To this idea? Sometimes it’s cheaper and better in the in the long run to start ALL the way over. How long will the lot be vacant? Not sold… vacant. - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:17 pm: Lipstick on a pig. - @misterjayem - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:18 pm: While I generally tilt towards the preservationist side in matters like this, Helmut Jahn’s James R. Thompson Center should be endangered. And the problem isn’t that it’s ugly. The Picasso is ugly too — and no one should ever touch it. The problem is that, unlike the Picasso, the Thompson Center is a building, and buildings have jobs. And Thompson Center has failed at its jobs for decades. Not only is the Thompson Center an office building that fails to function as an office building, it’s also a public space that fails to function as a public space. (And the less said about its singularly unappetizing food court, the better.) The Thompson Center is an interesting piece of art — http://www.mascontext.com/events/starship-chicago/ — but as a state employee, it’s a notorious goldbricker. So if it’s replaced by a functioning building, I won’t cry to see it go. – MrJM - anon - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:18 pm: I think it actually is uglier with the new design, but if a new buyer wishes to adopt this design so be it. Either way, the State needs to sell the land and building and move. - Uncle Ernie - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:22 pm: They always told me Garbage in, Garbage out… The JRT was a monstrosity the first time I saw it during construction, between the classic buildings that surround it, and it still is a mess. That open space is impossible to heat and cool efficiently, do we really need more retail and outrageously expensive residential space in the heart of the city? Maybe if the Amazon deal happens, but I am not holding my breath, tear the JRT down and wait for the next real need to arise. - Michelle Flaherty - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:22 pm: Very realistic artist rendering. Four newspaper boxes and two appear empty/defunct. Question 1: Is there a top to the tower? “Two-story entrance bays at the plaza would be removed to create open connections between the outside and the voluminous atrium to become a truly public space.” Question(s) 2: So the current JRTC will just be open to the outside? As in no doors? In February? In Chicago? - Arthur Andersen - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:24 pm: A creative, inspired, dog that won’t hunt. 13,000 sf floor plates are tiny in today’s market. Hotel and Condo pricing probably can’t support that cost, let alone office. There may be a solution, but this isn’t it. - Grandpa2 - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:26 pm: I have worked there for 20 years. I believe in historic preservation. But, my vote would be to tear it down and build a more sensible building that is economical, functional, and attractive. - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:31 pm: Really It is ugly and probably not practical - Give Me A Break - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:36 pm: Just start the dozzers and finish it off. First time I was in the office of a state agency director at the JRTC, I thought to myself I’ve seen rank and file state employees with better offices. - Last Bull Moose - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:40 pm: I think it should be torn down and start over. Nothing worth saving. I did not mind the space when working there. Got to see a police dog take down a man. Can’t see that in most offices. I thought they could install zip lines to go across the atrium. Would have livened up the place. - d.p.gumby - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:42 pm: Ever since the gridiron show that called it Starship Illinois, the place has been doomed. When they had to cut office doors b/c of cost, it was clear that short cuts were everywhere. Now looking at the rust and disintegration of the building, tearing it down may not be required…it will crumble on its own. Like a bad 70’s movie, it does not stand up over time and adding ugly doesn’t help. - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 3:57 pm: I’m a docent for CAF. I think it should never have been built and needs to go. - DarkDante - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:03 pm: The opportunity cost of the maintaining the Center is disgustingly high for a state in Illinois’s fiscal position. In addition to the (at last blush) $250M in in deferred maintenance, we would also have to forego the ([over]estimated) sales price of $300M. I like the building; it shows architectural growth from modernity to post-modernity, and adds a little flare to downtown. But its, sadly, gonna (not gotta, but gonna) go. - Cook County Commoner - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:08 pm: And who will pay for a rebuild? A task force just announced that the IDVA’s Quincy IL home should be rebuilt to the tune of $200 million plus. And construction of the new vet home on Chicago’s northwest side, started in 2014, is at a standstill. Presumably the Illinois money folks would salivate to the point of a slip and fall hazard to get a piece of downtown. Too bad the vets don’t draw the same interest. - A Jack - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:09 pm: It doesn’t look particularly stable. Between the lake winds and the New Madrid tremors, you aren’t going to get me to stay there. And McQuery’s hurricane would definitely take it out. Heck, the building leaks anyway. How much worse would it be with thousands of tons of steel hanging on the side. - Bud Keyes - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:11 pm: The office space is terrible. Crazy offices, odd shaped workspaces. Most offices have no windows. Poorly thought out. Not enough space for file cabinets etc… Would this upgrade any of it? If not, why bother. - Anon - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:48 pm: Knock it down and build a casino hotel over and around the el station. - and your dog is gay - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 4:59 pm: Nothing saying they wouldn’t spend a fortune replacing it with another ugly dysfunctional building. This is Illinois. - Old and In The Way - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 5:06 pm: Give it to Amazon in lieu of tax breaks and be done with it. Probably cheaper and a better outcome. /s - a drop in - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 5:08 pm: The addition looks like a lipstick applicator. - cc - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 5:17 pm: Was told by a firefighter to never stay in any building above seventh floor because of water pressure issues. - cannon649 - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 6:47 pm: turn it over to a ta paying devoloper type and do let any government agency (or crony) make a dime. All procedes should go direct to unfunded pensions - - Anonymous - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 6:53 pm: Where is the ski jump? - Chalant - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 9:25 pm: Where’s the cow when you need it? - Allknowingmasterofraccondom - Wednesday, May 2, 18 @ 9:39 pm: Only slightly uglier than Soldier Field. - Anonymous - Thursday, May 3, 18 @ 12:41 am: I wondered when I’d hear the same old: “it doesn’t fill the entire lot with enclosed spaces, therefore it’s wasteful and inefficient” trope. That’s not the problem, like the building or not. Jahn’s design brief, given to him, called for x amount of square footage. There were many ways to divide that up, from a single massive skyscraper like the Daley Center building, to a low, wide, chunky, fortress-like building like the old County hospital or old Sun-Times building. Along with the office space requirements were requirements for plaza space. And considerations for being all-weather in our variable climate. Jahn’s design is basically three more or less conventional short, connected skyscrapers in a triangle, encircled in glass to enclose an all-season public plaza space. If he had scaled the buildings up vertically, or spread it out more horizontally, to take up much more of the plaza area, he’d have generated too many offices by a factor of ten or more. It’s due to the square-cube law. Unused, extra offices that still need materials and labor, heating, cooling, power, water. No. He scaled the complex to the size of the anticipated workforce and tenants. And it’s nice to have a big open area here and there when encircled by vertical canyons on all sides. Finally, people without any education in design or art, who see space defining and counterpointing form in architecture are always going on about “filling-in that -wasted- space” and “putting it to efficient use”. Like everybody *wants* to live or work in lightless, airless little cells like a prison. Or some kind of warehouse. I always wonder if these kinds of people live it like they talk it: does their home contain no high ceilings anywhere, no space not allotted to being filled with “stuff” like eggs in a carton? I’d bet not. Le Corbusier said: “A building is a machine for living in.” We can argue if Jan’s design succeeds or not, if it’s art or not. But if you understand what the rules were and what the goals were, and what the budget and square footage requirements were… everything he designed makes kind of sense. Complaining about closet space, really? In a digital age where the bulk of the work is virtual, not paper? I can’t buy it. I will stipulate that Helmut is not the best at HVAC system design. Then again, he *did* specify better glass that would have blocked more of the summer heat from getting in, but the builders went with something cheaper that was not to spec. Like the carpet too. Jahn’s design was built by state-contracted people who did NOT follow his plans, who short-cutted everywhere and changed the rules of the game after it started. And the tenant, the state, was a horrible tenant that deferred all kinds of maintenance for decades. How would your house look if you didn’t keep it up for a decade? Do you really think a remodel or new construction would be any different? It’s not the building: it’s the tenant. - Ace - Thursday, May 3, 18 @ 9:12 am: Landmarks Illinois does a great service to these buildings and the community. Creative thought like this keeps areas thriving. - @misterjayem - Thursday, May 3, 18 @ 9:39 am: Jahn designed an architectural orchid. Illinois should not be in the orchid business. – MrJM Sorry, comments for this post are now closed.