The former site of the Big Bay Lumber Yard could soon be the site of the largest modern all-timber office building in the nation, according to a recent report from Curbed Chicago. The six-story timber structure is being planned by Houston-based commercial real estate developer Hines on Goose Island, which is in the River West neighborhood. 

The building would be located at 1017 W. Division Street and feature ground-floor retail, 275 parking spaces, bike storage, a fitness center, and rooftop deck, according to an article by the Chicago Tribune. 

The 270,000-square-foot structure would be the first wooden building Chicago since the 1800s but is a part of a larger national trend of wooden buildings. Hines recently worked with Vancouver-based Michael Green Architecture and Chicago-based DLR Group on a 220,000-square-foot wooden office building in Minneapolis that is fully leased. 

The trend is growing because the building process is much faster and more environmentally friendly than the traditional steel and concrete construction. The project is called T3 Goose Island, which stands for timber, technology, and transit. 

Manufacturing methods and improved technology have made the trend possible, allowing developers to work with large and densely engineered pieces of mass timber that are easy and quick to form into a building. Those pieces are also fire-resistant, meaning that they char instead of burn.

The project still needs to go through city approval. It’s located in the North Branch Corridor, which recently saw a full rezoning to make way for denser and non-industrial projects. If approved, the project will be completed in about a year, which is several months faster than more traditional construction.