Residents oppose planned 5-story condos in Lake Zurich
A few hundred feet from the busy intersection of West Main Street and Route 22 in Lake Zurich, homeowners along Robertson Avenue are preparing for what could be a lengthy battle.
The enemy is a pair of five-story condominium buildings, which would tower over roughly 35 large-lot, single-family homes in this quiet neighborhood.
The proposal for Nestlerest Park by South Shore Real Estate Development calls for 110 condos with an underground parking garage for 240 cars. It would be located on roughly 5 acres off Robertson Avenue along the southern lakefront.
Residents worry about the development's impact on traffic, and they dislike the aesthetic imposition. But perhaps the greatest fear for homeowners is the project could trigger a massive redevelopment of the entire south shore of the lakefront.
A village board committee recently gave the proposal a green light for plan commission review without any recommendation. Village trustees urged the developer to work with residents on their concerns with the project.
Feedback residents gave at a neighborhood meeting with the developer will help shape the plan, said David Smith of Barrington, who is a managing partner of Equity Services Group, one of the owners of South Shore.
Smith said the final proposal will almost surely involve two buildings whose height is undetermined, with underground parking.
Robertson Avenue residents have formed a group dubbed Citizens Alliance for Responsible Development to fight the project. They have packed recent village board meetings to voice their opposition and collected roughly 700 signatures against the proposal on petitions circulating in town and through a Web site.
Signs reading "Save the trees … Stop the high-rises," "Enforce single-family zoning" and "Nestlerest Over-development: Another bad idea for Lake Zurich" now dot Robertson Avenue and many other roadways in town.
"People are clamoring for them," said Judi Thode, who lives at 52 Robertson Ave. "We had 60 go out and we have an order for 100 more. We think we have struck a nerve."
Group leaders say many residents who signed the petitions are frustrated with how the village has managed its downtown revitalization.
The village's planned five-story condominium project targeted for a stretch of Main Street across from the lakefront promenade died when officials fired the master developer. Officials are eyeing other developers, South Shore included, to revive that project.
Though the Nestlerest proposal is not part of that plan, it's making area homeowners nervous that other properties along Robertson Avenue may soon become targets for redevelopment.
Longtime village resident Wanda Grever, who owns two properties just east of the proposed Nestlerest condos with her daughters, said she was approached by the developer but refused to sell. Her two properties combined have greater lakefront access than the Nestlerest site.
"I'm very irritated over it," said the 80-year-old Grever. "Who wants a 5-story house next to theirs? All the people on Robertson Road and South Shore Lane do not want this."
Smith said he hasn't given up hopes of buying Grever's and another adjacent property.
"That part of the lake is virtually an extension of the downtown," Smith said. "At some point, if the village were to see the strategic synergy with the downtown, whether it's us or anyone, there could be some logic in (developing) that south shore part of the lake."