CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- A new development is being planned for Chicago’s industrial Southeast Side, but it would be underground.
Construction materials company Ozinga Brothers, Inc. wants to build a six million square foot warehouse facility under polluted ground north of 116th and Burley, where Republic Steel used to be in the East Side neighborhood.
The proposed space, to be built over 13 years, would be 250 to 350 feet underground. According to the Sun-Times, the thought, right now, is for it to house storage, data centers, light manufacturing and more.
Planners said cleaning the toxic land could cost hundreds of millions of dollars, but Ozinga Brothers, Inc. believes by locating the facility underground they can avoid that and still operate safely.
Project developers hope to gain city approval later this year with a plan to begin construction in 2022. The company has not yet purchased the 140 acres of land.
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But, Peggy Salazar, director of the Southeast Environmental Task Force, told the Sun-Times she and other residents are very suspicious about any new project, because of the city’s history of placing so much pollution-causing industries in the community.
“I’m very leery about this project,” Salazar said. “We don’t know what the noise factor is going to be like, we don’t know what the dust factor is going to be. Are they going to be using explosives? There are just too many unanswered questions, but more importantly is that the type of project we want in someone’s backyard?”