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Politics & Government

Oak Park Looks to the Past for Ike Strategy

Architectural survey results could help "sensitize" IDOT on impact of expressway expansion.

As the state continues to study whether the Eisenhower Expressway should be expanded through Oak Park, village officials have developed a strategy that could help“sensitize” transportation officials to the impact the overhaul will have on the village’s architecture and history.

Oak Park has asked a firm to assess whether any of the roughly 1,000 buildings along the Interstate 290 corridor between Austin Boulevard and Harlem Avenue should be designated local landmarks.

Any possible expansion of the Eisenhower – an idea explored since the late 1990s – could mean potential demolition of buildings along that corridor, village officials said.

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Conducting the survey will be Preservation Services and Technology Group of Kentucky, which was awarded the contract Monday. The cost is $29,000, with most of that coming from a state grant.

The study, which could take several months, will look at an area generally from Jackson Street on the north, Lexington and Harvard on the south.

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The village’s lone is located in that area as is . A branch is also in the area.

Three important community buildings are also located there: the of the Oak Park Public Library, 845 Gunderson Ave.; the Odd Fellows Hall, 812-818 Harrison St. and the .

Of those three, the conservatory is the only one of the three on the National Register of Historic Places. The other two are local landmarks.

“We don’t know when things are going to happen, but the sooner we get it done the better,” said Doug Kaare, Oak Park's urban planner.

Rob Cole, Oak Park’s assistant village manager, said the survey had been planned for awhile and would have been undertaken at some point. But given that this is a major capital investment on the state’s part, they want to tell the Illinois Department of Transportation some of what’s at stake.

A similar kind of study was not even contemplated when the Eisenhower – originally designated as the Congress Park Expressway – was initially built in the 1950s. Although the village fought construction, an untold number of homes and businesses were eliminated when the “ditch," as some like to call the Ike, was constructed. 

Since the late 1990s, the state has been looking at how to expand the highway as a way to mitigate traffic. One proposal on the table is the addition of a dedicated high occupancy vehicle, or HOV, lane in either direction from Mannheim Road east to Cicero Avenue.

But a spokesman for the IDOT said selecting an alternative is still months away. More evaluations and community advisory meetings are in the offing, Guy Tridgell said.

Oak Park has vigorously objected to expansion from the start.

Village officials expressed concern not only about the architectural and historical impact an expansion could have, but also the adverse environmental impact. Oak Park was ranked as one of the largest diesel “hot spots” because of its proximity to truck traffic along the Eisenhower.

At least two studies dating back to the 1980s have shown that the existing noise from the Expressway exceeds federal standards.

The village’s solution is to expand the CTA Blue Line from Forest Park west to Oak Brook and Oak Brook Terrace, which could greatly bolster the region’s use of public transportation, Cole said.

Tridgell said the agency would be evaluating "any and all alternatives.”

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