CITY HALL — The Commission on Chicago Landmarks on Thursday rejected a final appeal for demolition of a so-called worker cottage in the Old Town Triangle.
Owners claimed economic hardship in making a last-ditch appeal to raze the building at 1639 N. North Park Ave. Dan Waters, brother of John Waters, who died in 2011 and whose estate was trying to clear the property for redevelopment, insisted he was actually trying to beautify the area.
Following arguments he made at a public hearing last December, Waters suggested the cottage was now the odd man out on a street that has seen considerable development over the decades.
City officials on Thursday rejected claims of economic hardship, however, and they previously defended the building as a prototypical example of a worker cottage of a sort built in the Old Town Triangle in the years following the Great Chicago Fire in 1871.
The commission unanimously rejected demolition in what was termed a "final decision" on the agenda for Thursday's meeting.
“I’m glad it is coming to an end,” Waters said. “But I find it interesting that this city can tell a property owner what to do with his property.”
The Waters estate can appeal to the courts, but otherwise the matter is done in city proceedings.
No public comment on the matter was permitted, as it was the subject of a previous public hearing.
