When the Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Memorial Hospital decamped from its 130-year home in Lincoln Park,

Three glass and steel towers — 145 feet, 250 feet and 290 feet tall — aim to tread lightly on a site that also contains historic facades along residential and commercial streets. The new design calls for 698 multi-unit rentals and more than 160,000 square feet of retail. Parking is largely taken care of already, thanks to an existing 898-stall garage.

Development of the large hospital complex swallowed up some of the historic buildings that front onto Fullerton and North Orchard Street. To preserve the neighborhood’s historic character, the team will reconstruct and restore those buildings.

“We tried to be very much a Lincoln Park project,” Lee said. Still community members expressed anxiety at the high-rises, which they worried aloud might exacerbate an overcrowded school system and disrupt the character of their neighborhood. Others cheered the thrust of the in-progress development, noting those same schools sorely need the property tax revenues of just such a high-density development.