A long-vacant corner near the former Cabrini-Green towers is finally getting a new chapter. The City of Chicago has signed off on a seven-story, 78-unit apartment building at Oak Street and Larrabee Street on the Near North Side, clearing the way for a mixed-income project where an empty lot has sat for years. Of the 78 units, 54 are slated as affordable housing for households earning 30 to 80 percent of the area median income.
According to Chicago YIMBY, the City issued the building permit on March 18 and recorded a reported construction cost of $36,887,188. The filing functions as an all-in-one full building permit that includes approval for concrete piles in the foundation and follows an application submitted on November 20, 2023, after roughly 849 days of review.
Design work for the project comes from Pappageorge Haymes Partners, and development duties fall to Oak-Larrabee LLC, a joint venture between Brinshore Development and The Michaels Organization. Plans call for a mix of studios through three-bedroom units, with all dwelling units arranged on the building’s upper six floors.
Project filings describe the effort as new construction of a seven-story structure with a concrete-pile foundation and 39 parking spaces at grade, details that appear in public records for the site. Zoning-stage documents and the application record for 955 N. Larrabee are posted by Chicago Cityscape.
Funding and site context
The development previously secured $14 million in tax-increment financing from the City Council, a financial assistance that helped move the project from concept toward permits. Urbanize Chicago reported on the TIF approval, while planning materials from the Chicago Housing Authority identify the parcel as part of a larger CHA-linked redevelopment effort in the broader Cabrini area.
Where things stand
So far, there is no public timeline for when construction will start or when the first residents might move in. The development team has not released a schedule for crews, leasing, or opening dates. As Chicago YIMBY notes, earlier planning materials once floated a 2024 construction start with an opening this summer, a projection that no longer lines up with the permit timeline.
For Near North residents, the project represents a sizable injection of affordable rentals on a long-idle block and a reminder of how layered financing, public approvals, and multi-year reviews control when shovels actually hit the ground. City filings and permit logs will be the clearest signposts for when crews mobilize, and neighbors can expect those bureaucratic breadcrumbs to tell the story of when this long-empty corner finally turns into housing.
