Two new initiatives are turning vacant lots into housing on Chicago’s West Side in North Lawndale and East Garfield Park.
Local officials gathered at the end of last month to celebrate the groundbreaking of the Turning Point, a multi-family residential building in East Garfield Park.
And at the start of this month, applications opened for developers to join in on the city’s pilot program for its Missing Middle initiative in North Lawndale.
The goal of Missing Middle is to build “missing” middle-density buildings on vacant city-owned land. By offering owner-occupied, low-cost housing, officials hope to help repopulate South and West Side neighborhoods after decades of systemic disinvestment.
The initiative is part a $75 million program by Chicago’s Department of Planning and Development and the latest project to be a part of a $1.25 billion bond for affordable housing and economic development in the city.
The Turning Point
The Turning Point is led by Breakthrough, a nonprofit in Garfield Park that provides 20,000 residents each year with education, food, housing, job training and other resources. The new project will offer 14 units of two- and three-bedroom affordable housing to community members.
The residential building, constructed on six vacant lots in the 3300 block of W. Carroll Avenue, will include amenities and gathering spaces. Residents of the building will have access to Breakthrough programs, including those for education, workforce development and financial coaching.
Breakthrough’s affordable housing project comes at a time when Chicago is facing a shortage of 120,000 affordable housing units, according to the City’s Department of Housing. And while Breakthrough provides 60 beds of transitional housing in Garfield Park and support to 50 off-site apartments, the Turning Point marks a new effort for affordable housing in the neighborhood.
“The need for affordable housing and opportunities to increase income has never been greater,” said Breakthrough’s Executive Director Yolanda Fields at the Turning Point’s groundbreaking. “So, you can understand our excitement for this project. Families in our community will be able to access opportunities to build skills for increased income.”
The Turning Point’s affordable units are set to open in 2026.
Missing Middle
This month, developers can start applying to build housing on 44 vacant city-owned lots as a part of the Missing Middle initiative in North Lawndale.
In North Lawndale from 2018 to 2022, over 42% of residents had a household income less than $25,000, according to the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning. The median sale price for a single-family home in Chicago’s Austin and North Lawndale neighborhoods is over $200,000, according to the Cook County House Price Index.
Missing Middle is a strategy under that aims to repopulate neighborhoods like North Lawndale by building homes with city land and financing. Through Missing Middle’s pilot phase in North Lawndale, vacant lots will be transformed into multi-unit buildings, which could provide more than 160 housing units.
Qualified housing developers can buy each lot for $1 to redevelop into residential buildings, ranging from single-family homes to six-flats. The lots will be sold to developers in six clusters, containing at least five lots each. The city will also provide up to $150,000 per unit in construction assistance.
Interested developers must attend at least one virtual webinar to apply, either on Oct. 9 at 1 p.m. or Oct. 10 at 2 p.m. Developers can apply to build on a cluster of lots through the ChiBlockBuilder land sale portal through Nov. 15.
Finished homes will be sold at market rate. And if the pilot phase goes well, the city may expand its Missing Middle strategy to other neighborhoods on Chicago’s South and West Sides.
According to officials, North Lawndale was selected as Missing Middle’s pilot project because of its land value, zoning, and local investments.
