Work on the slow-to-materialize IMD Gateway development showed an encouraging sign of life this week when the city awarded a full build-out permit for the multiphase project's 11-story residential tower. 

The $50 million "Gateway Apartments" are now clear to rise near the intersection of Ogden Avenue and Polk Street in the Illinois Medical District on Chicago's Near West Side.

Developed by Gateway Development Partners LLC, the upcoming building will feature 161 rental units and ground-floor retail space. Chicago-based Piekarz Associates is listed as the project's design architect. 

Seventeen of the building's apartments will be rented below-market-rate. The developers plan to market those units to essential union workers such as nurses, healthcare workers, and firefighters, according to the AFL-CIO Housing Investment Trust, which serves as a financial partner on the development. 

The 10-acre IMD Gateway site is located at the corner of Ogden and Polk on Chicago's Near West Side.Google Street View

Efforts to redevelop the vacant 10-acre "Gateway" parcel have been in discussion since at least 2016 and have moved slowly. The first phase of the project, which features a Starbucks-anchored retail strip, a small plaza, and a parking lot, broke ground in 2018 and was completed in 2019.

The Gateway Apartments will eventually be joined by a six-story hotel development. Below-ground work on both the apartments and the hotel began last summer after the project's developers received foundation permits in July 2020.