Oddly-Shaped Buildings Emerge Where Land Is Scarce

Oddly shaped buildings are emerging in areas where land is scarce and valuable, enraging some neighborhood residents.

1 minute read

September 27, 2003, 9:00 AM PDT

The mayor and village officials of Deerfield, IL "have been peppered with complaints" over a 1,100 sq ft, downsized home being built on a small corner lot, that is shaped like a slice of pie....Developers have been squeezing odd-shaped buildings onto valuable land in Chicago for years, city officials said. Brent Ryan, an urban planning professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, cited examples of unusual homes in such cities as Boston and New York. Officials in the Big Apple in the 1980s adopted zoning changes to deal with 'sliver' apartments after developers began wedging narrow 200-foot-tall buildings between low-rise buildings....Developers comb through communities looking for land that can be built on for profit....The reaction to the 'pie house' prompted the village's Community Development Department to try to find other small lots that could be developed under similar circumstances. They came up empty-handed."

Thanks to Connie Chung

FULL STORY: 'Pie House' Half-Baked, Some Think

Thursday, September 25, 2003 in The Chicago Tribune

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