JDL, Kayne Anderson Break Ground on $3B Foundry Park in Chicago

JDL Development and Kayne Anderson Real Estate broke ground Wednesday on Foundry Park, a $3 billion, 31-acre mixed-use project on the former A. Finkl & Sons steel site along the Chicago River’s North Branch. The ceremony was held at Cortland and Kingsbury streets in the Clybourn Corridor. It follows a $201.6 million tax increment financing subsidy the Finance Committee approved in September.

Why it matters

For Chicago developers, Foundry Park is a test of whether a megaproject that stalled under a prior owner can actually clear financing and move dirt. Sterling Bay controlled this same parcel under the Lincoln Yards name and never broke ground on the office towers it proposed. JDL and Kayne Anderson acquired the northern half of that site in 2025 and reached groundbreaking inside roughly a year, a pace JDL founder Jim Letchinger tied to capital readiness. “We go fast, and we had the capital. Capital is critical,” Letchinger said at the event. For construction firms, the project signals a multi-year pipeline of residential, retail, and hotel work on the North Branch, with the first vertical phase already scoped.

The numbers

At full build-out, Foundry Park calls for more than 3,700 homes, with 20% set aside as affordable, alongside 970,000 square feet of combined office, retail, and hotel space and a 183-room hotel. The project’s tallest tower is planned at roughly 40 stories. The first phase, centered near Southport Avenue and Cortland and Kingsbury streets, includes more than 725 residential units plus retail, underground parking, and public green space, with developers targeting substantial completion by 2029. The $201.6 million TIF subsidy, drawn against the Cortland and Chicago River TIF district, is earmarked largely for rebuilding Southport and Cortland streets to carry the new development.

What’s next

Site work and vertical construction on the first residential buildings begin now, with that phase targeted for delivery by 2029. The TIF district is set to expire in 2043, after which city officials project the site will generate roughly $70 million a year in citywide property tax revenue. Subsequent phases, covering the remainder of the 3,700-plus homes and the office and hotel components, will require their own construction timelines and permits as the developers sequence the build-out.