New building planned where fire gutted downtown Mt. Prospect landmark
The site of the former Sakura restaurant in Mount Prospect, gutted by a 2014 fire that destroyed a downtown landmark, could be home to a new building by next summer, a village official said Monday.
Mount Prospect Community Development Director Bill Cooney confirmed that Chicago-based Norwood Builders is under contract to purchase the site of the restaurant at 105 S. Main St. A combination of restaurant and retail uses are likely to be developed there, he said.
"They are reviewing a couple different options, the leading one being the construction of about 7,000 to 8,000 square feet of single-story retail space," Cooney said, adding that a couple of local restaurateurs have expressed interest.
Work on the project could begin as early as the spring of 2016, with businesses opening in the new building as soon as next summer. The project first would need to go to the village board for approval.
Norwood officials could not be reached immediately for comment Monday.
The company has an extensive history in Mount Prospect. It built the Emerson development, as well as the Lofts at Village Centre, and finished the Shires at Clock Tower development.
Norwood also built the first of the two seven-unit buildings of the Founders Row townhouses. But before the builder could sell all the units, the recession hit and the property went into foreclosure. The project was taken over and finished by Compass Real Estate Services, which bought the property at auction.
"It was timing," Cooney said. "The majority of the projects that were being built in 2007 (and) 2008 hit a wall. It was the recession, and they were highly leveraged on it, and the banks took it back."
A Feb. 9, 2014, fire destroyed the Sakura restaurant and parts of other businesses located in the 89-year-old Busse Building on the 100 block of South Main Street. Among the other tenants displaced by the fire were Central Continental Bakery, Picket Fence Realty and the Mount Prospect Chamber of Commerce.
What remained of the building after the fire eventually was demolished, leaving a vacant site in the heart of Mount Prospect's downtown.
An state fire marshal's report classified the as "incendiary in nature," but fire officials said there was no evidence it was set intentionally. In their search for the cause of the fire, investigators focused on a red plastic container holding an unspecified liquid and nearby straw material, both of which were inside a closet in the restaurant's basement.