Luxury apartments proposed for downtown Palatine

The wave of luxury apartments in downtown areas near the Union Pacific Northwest Line tracks is washing over Palatine.

This week, the Palatine plan commission heard a proposal for a three-story, 18-unit building at the southwest corner of Brockway Street and Palatine Road. The vacant property formerly was occupied by Kramer Photographers.

Architect Jim Tinaglia, representing developer Vu Trieu, president of the NorthShore Development Group, said at Tuesday's meeting two floors of the roughly 17,500-square-foot building would contain nine apartments each. An open-air parking garage accommodating 34 cars, including two handicap-accessible spaces, would fill almost the entire the ground floor.

The remaining ground floor space could include an area for residents with exercise machines that looks onto the street, thus enticing potential tenants.

The apartment also would include a trellised rooftop space for parties.

Tinaglia said apartments are gaining popularity.

"Folks don't want to come up with down payments," he said, adding, "They don't want to be stuck with a mortgage for 30 years."

Tinaglia said rents for apartments where his adult children live fall between $2,500 and $3,000 per month.

"It's crazy money," he said. "You can get a big mortgage for that. But they don't want it."

Tinaglia said the building is designed to look like a "modern version of an old building."

Five of the seven commissioners gave the preliminary plan a positive recommendation, which will head to the village board for review.

Commissioner Eric Friedman, who voted against the proposal, expressed concern that the village's transit-oriented development plan "does not suggest this being fully residential."

"It recommends a mixed use, which I think is really important at this intersection in our central business district," he said.

Referring to Tinaglia's position as an Arlington Heights village trustee, Friedman said he didn't think Tinaglia or his board would support a similar project at an important intersection in their central business district without a ground-level retail or service-oriented space.

"You're not wrong," Tinaglia agreed. "Certainly, I have an awful lot at stake in Arlington Heights with work that we do, as well as sitting where you sit. The problem that we have in small spaces like this is it becomes so expensive to rent."

Tinaglia referred to one of his projects, a seven-story building at Eastman Street and Dunton Avenue in Arlington Heights. But despite village staff's insistence on having ground-level retail, that space remains vacant.