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player ready...A proposal for a $60 million apartment and recreation complex for seniors that, at 14 stories, would become the city’s tallest building was rejected by the Des Plaines Plan Commission this week.
The Plan Commission voted 4-0 against approval of a planned unit development for the Riviera Independent Living Apartment project.
Barrington developer Nick Mitchell is proposing the complex on 6 acres at 1050 Oakton St. The site is surrounded by one-and two-story commercial buildings and single-family homes.
The 300-unit building, which would be three times the city’s current height restriction, would occupy a site that now has the Grazie! Ristorante restaurant owned by Mitchell and a vacant federal office building.
“If you allow this to go up in front of my house, anytime I look out my window or door I will see this 14-story monster,” Eva Corber, a 35-year resident of the 1400 block of Webster Lane, told Plan Commission members.
She was among about 20 residents who attended the meeting to oppose the proposal.
The building would be home to up to 400 people age 55 and older, Mitchell said.
He said the complex would employ 200 workers and contribute about $635,000 a year to city coffers.
“It’s a striking visual improvement to the Oakton Street corridor,” Mitchell said.
Mitchell said he reduced his original idea for a 175-foot-tall building to 134 feet by reducing the size of the residences.
Zoning regulations limit the proposed building to 45 feet, city officials said.
“The height doesn’t conform, the streets don’t conform and the residents are against this,” said Plan Commissioner Corinne Zobott. “The Plan Commission has been against this since day one, but the City Council continues to move it along.”
Commission Chairman Carl Kowalski said the project was being proposed “for profit and not with the best interests of the city in mind.”
The City Council, which has the authority to overrule the Plan Commission, will vote on the project Aug. 18, Ald. Tom Becker said.
In other action, city officials named Jim Prandini acting police chief.
Police Chief James Ryan retired earlier this month in Des Plaines and took the position of chief in the Forest Park Police Department.
Prandini, 49, a former deputy chief, has served as a city police officer for 23 years.