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1. ChrisHajer
   Member

   From Crain's http://chicagobusiness.com/cgi-bin/mag/article.pl?article_id=27194 about the Mayfair portion of Albany Park, in Chicago. From the article:

   Mayfair, a small community within Albany Park, includes the North Mayfair Bungalow Historic District, a collection of 700 bungalows dating from 1913 to 1930 that is recognized by the National Register of Historic Places.

   To blend in with the surrounding neighborhood, the architect incorporated early 20th-century design elements such as red brick, iron work and Arts and Crafts-style lamps.

   The new development is at Pulaski and Lawrence.

   The article describes how a Dominick's closed and they built a new shopping center there with five or six new stores: Staples, Walgreens, Starbucks, Jimmy Johns and T-Mobile. Also, a bank branch and 107 parking spaces. There is actually lots of good information in the article. One choice quote from Ron Duplack, president of the Mayfair Civic Assn: "Having an upscale development there definitely enhances our primary commercial corridor..."

   I thought, how weird that the article didn't mention TIF at all, since you can hardly throw a rock in Chicago and not hit a TIF district. So, I checked the City of Chicago's website, and, sure enough, this property falls within the "Lawrence/Pulaski" TIF.

   

   The north/south street in the image is Pulaski. Sorry, it's not labelled on their map.

   Posted Wednesday Feb 7, 2007 17:16 #

2. Catherine
   Member

   When you hear the word "upscale", you know the vulgarians are at the gate.

   This reminds me of when the people of Lincoln Square rather visibly expressed their disapproval of a new Starbucks, because they did not want their entirely satisfactory neighborhood turned into a yuppie cookie cutter.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 09:50 #

3. HRCollins
   Member

   The people who attack the fact Starbucks is going into a neighborhood simply amaze me. Why should a company like Starbucks not be allowed to open in a neighborhood but a mom and pop coffee shop should be encouraged to open? If the neighborhood was entirely satisfied on the coffee-latte front when the Starbucks opened then no one would have purchased products and the store would have closed.

   I hardly think of Starbucks as a yuppie cookie cutter store. The corner of 1st Ave. and Ogden is hardly a bastion of yuppieness. Starbucks is simply willing to sell a product to anybody who wishes purchase at a price that both parties find agreeable.

   Any business whether it is Starbucks, Bed Bath and Beyond or Heavenly Hot Dogs has right to try to make a go of it. If the community truly does not want the establishment then no one will patronize it and it will close up shop.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 11:30 #

4. KimJ
   Member

   HRCollins,

   I love Starbucks, don't get me wrong. But I love our local mom and pops too. One of the things that makes Riverside special is that we have no chains. Everyone else does! Our downtown does not look like every other strip mall. Someday in the not so distant future, people will search out the unique and not settle for commonplace.
   About any business making a go of it, I agree, go for it. But why are they not here already? Do we need to bribe them with TIF funds to get here? If we take their risk, and they bomb, we hold the bag, and an empty Starbucks.

   Did you know in Roselle (thanks to their TIF) no one but big chains can afford the "top of the line" rents complements of their re-development. The developer offered Starbucks 3 years free rent to come in and they said no thanks. No one better than Starbucks knows their market. Perhaps that is why they are not already here.

   A friend of mine in Zurich is now in charge of Starbucks placements in Austria, Germany, and Switzerland. Really wild, right across the street from the Bahnhof in Bern, Starbucks! (not sure why Euros need Starbucks, all their coffee is good!) I asked him what he looks for when searching for shop sites, he said first is pedestrians, like thousands walking by every day, or cars, tens of thousands driving by every day with very quick access to park. Even with a TIF that does not sound like Riverside, or at the very least, not the Riverside I moved into. I like our small town. It is nice to know everyone. I would rather have less cars coming thru our downtown than more.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 13:35 #

5. Catherine
   Member

   Collins, thank you for making my point about market demand, from which it naturally follows that there is no need for TIFs to attract businesses. Profits attract and keep businesses.

   As to Ogden and 1st, don't make me laugh. That cannot be compared to an old distinctive neighborhood with old coffee shops like Lincoln Square. I'm sure at some point Ogden and 1st had character, but not now.

   Let them drink Starbucks in Bern today; in ten or twenty years they will be wondering what happened to the character of their town. Like so many towns in this country that lost their downtowns to strip malls, owing to their novelty, parking and so on, and who now want their character back. But now the buildings are gone and so are the businesses.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 15:23 #

6. MikeT
   Member

   Come on, everyone, Ogden and 1st was always rock solid. In fact, I always felt it was kind of a holey place.

   .
   miket

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 15:51 #

7. spatny
   Member

   Just down the road - where the Snowflake is now - or was - there used to be a big, old Riverside style house. It was a brothel called the Pigeon Farm. One of my classmates grandmothers was the madam. It was a scary place, like the one in East of Eden. Ltons was a wild town 50-60 years ago. Now it's got Starbucks and Jimmy-John's. At least the Zupa is still interesting.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 17:16 #

8. Catherine
   Member

   Don't forget the BP station. That adds a lot of class and character too.

   Posted Thursday Feb 8, 2007 23:49 #

9. Lonnie
   Member

   Don, were you ever one of the pigeons? DON'T ANSWER THAT! Actually, Lyons is an example of where I think a TIF is appropriate [the quarry]. Here you have a parcel that a developer won't touch because he can't afford to fill it in. The parcel probably produces little or no tax revenue. A TIF will form a public-private partnership to benefit both. The TIF is a last resort to make the place something other than a hole in the ground. That's hardly Riverside's situation, where a district that is merely trailing another in EAV increases is used as justification for the sledge hammer approach to revitalization, i.e. taking money from the other taxing bodies to give to developers or building infrastructure to benefit new development.

   Posted Saturday Feb 10, 2007 11:19 #

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