Townhouses proposed for Portage Park site near Narragansett & Cuyler

by BRIAN NADIG

Alderman Nicholas Sposato (38th) will hold a community meeting on Tuesday, Sept. 11, on a proposal to build townhouses at 4051 N. Narragansett Ave.

The meeting will be held at 6 p.m. at the Merrimac Park fieldhouse, 6343 W. Irving Park Road.

Plans call for the approximately 8,830-square-foot parcel to be rezoned from RS-2, which is intended primarily for single-family homes, to the less restrictive RT-4. The city’s zoning map shows that the back half of the 300-foot deep lot is wider than the front half.

The existing one-story building on the property would be demolished to accommodate the project. The Cook County Assessor’s Web site lists the 94-year-old frame structure as having two residential units.

“It’s just a weird piece of property,” Sposato said. “You’re taking an eyesore out, and you’re putting in $500,000 townhomes, seven or eight of them.”

Each townhouse would consist of two floors above a basement, and there would be outdoor parking, which would be accessible from an east-west alley that runs from Narragansett to the far east end of the parcel, according to Sposato.

Meanwhile, Sposato also reported that a developer who planned to convert a commercial building at 5744 W. Irving Park Road into six apartments, with monthly rents as high as $3,000, has pulled out of the project but that another developer is interested in the site.