St. Viator planning for new $7 million to $8 million cafeteria

St. Viator High School is in the early stages of planning for a new state-of-the-art cafeteria for students at the private Arlington Heights school, officials said.

A plan for the $7 million to $8 million cafeteria will be approved by school officials early next year, with construction hopefully to be completed by August 2015, said the school's principal the Rev. Corey Brost.

Brost said the idea is for the new cafeteria to be similar to what students would find on a college campus. It would also be similar to an Internet cafe, with space for students to do homework and work on their iPads. Representatives from the school appeared before the Arlington Heights Plat and Subdivision Committee last week to present and get feedback on the preliminary plans.

According to a village report, St. Viator is considering the reconstruction for several reasons, including that the current cafeteria is 50 years old and has an interior grease trap that needs to be moved outside.

With the newer, larger cafeteria, St. Viator would be able to have three lunch periods instead of four, which would help with scheduling, the report states. The school also would use the space to hold awards banquets, which are often now held off-site, according to the report.

The project would include demolition of the existing single-story cafeteria at the southeast corner of the school building. The school would also demolish chain-link batting cages toward the southwest baseball diamond — not including the new batting cages — to make room for a new, 3,100-square-foot storage building for sports equipment.

The school still must present the project to the village's plan commission and later the village board before moving forward.