Latest Reporting
Recent reporting on preservation, redevelopment, demolition, public decisions, and the places changing across the region.
Watchlist Blog
August 24, 2026
Crossroads YMCA continues to target Fall 2026 for a campus joining youth programs, health services, childcare, recreation, training, and gathering space on former school ground.
The new construction does not preserve Tolleston's old school buildings, but it carries the site's public-service role into a broader neighborhood institution.
Watchlist Blog
August 20, 2026
Nearly 100 mph winds broke hundreds of poles, but the long restoration turned physical damage into lost food, closed schools, medical risk, and neighborhood-scale hardship.
More than 20,000 Gary customers remained without power eight days after the August 11 derecho, with full restoration then projected for August 25.
Watchlist Blog
July 6, 2026
A July bid notice places Gary's best-known ruin inside the regional blight-elimination program, ending years when stabilization and a public ruins garden remained possible.
The RDA is seeking a contractor to demolish City Methodist and the former St. Mary's Hospital, shifting the church from unresolved landmark to impending loss.
Watchlist Blog
August 3, 2026
CHA closed financing for 183 mixed-income homes at the former public-housing site, with construction expected to begin in August and completion planned for 2028.
The first two buildings return housing to a site cleared by 2011, including 91 CHA apartments, 74 other affordable homes, and 18 market-rate units.
Watchlist Blog
July 29, 2026
Work has begun to turn a 1968 SOM office tower into 320 apartments, one of the Mag Mile's clearest responses to downtown office vacancy.
The conversion retains the modern tower and its retail base while rebuilding vacant upper floors for housing and adding a new rooftop amenity level.
Watchlist Blog
August 5, 2026
By early August, little remained of the 1903 building that housed the restaurant's longtime flagship; a 46-unit Belmora phase is planned for the transit-rich site.
The business survives at other addresses, but demolition removes the physical setting that tied Ann Sather to generations of Belmont Avenue street life.
Location Posts
Public place records with maps, source notes, historical context, current status, and related reading.
Research Record
Updated 2026
Nearly 100 mph winds damaged hundreds of poles, closed schools, interrupted businesses and medical needs, and turned community centers into essential emergency infrastructure.
Research Record
Updated 2026
The restaurant relocated, but the loss of its longtime building closes a distinct chapter in the commercial life surrounding the Belmont elevated station.
Research Record
Updated 2026
A 28-story apartment tower will replace a labor and health-care building whose atrium and paired Brotherhood Monument sculptures gave the corner a distinctive public...
Research Record
Updated 2026
Financing closed in August 2026 for two six-story buildings with 183 mixed-income homes, beginning a long-delayed return of housing to the cleared Garfield Ridge...
Research Record
Updated 2026
The 24-story tower will keep ground-floor retail while vacant offices become housing and a new rooftop level changes the building's original profile.
Research Record
Updated 2026
The Pine Grove project preserves a monumental street presence while replacing the sanctuary, dome, roof, and most of the historic building behind it.