Developers Tweak Lake Street Hotel Project

Sertus Capital Partners will continue to work with Oak Park on developing Lake Street and Forest Avenue, but they'll shift focus away from a hotel-condominium complex and instead onto luxury apartments.

The development company got the go-ahead at Monday's Oak Park Village Board meeting to work with village officials on revisions to the original agreement.

The changes will come back to trustees for approval next month. The project would then have to go back to the Plan Commission for review and recommendation.

for new hotel construction and a soft real estate market for condominiums prompted Sertus to abandon its controversial plan, which called for a 140-room hotel, 85 condominiums and 28,000 square feet of retail space contained in a 20-story tower — all wrapped around a new 510-space parking garage.

The retail component will remain, as will the design concept. A new, but perhaps smaller, parking garage is being contemplated.

Troubling signs surrounding securing funding began surfacing in when the board gave Sertus until December to get a building permit for the $85 million project. The effort has been in the works for two years.

“I want everybody to be clear, in approving the (development), we never promised a hotel,” said Trustee Colette Lueck, quoted in TribLocal. “(Sertus) didn’t promise a hotel and the board didn’t promise a hotel. What we promised was to test the hotel in the market and see whether or not it could fly. And the answer is that it didn’t.”