Work to begin on improvements to Milwaukee Avenue in Lake County
Anyone who has driven on Milwaukee Avenue north of Route 137 at certain times of day has learned to be patient with what is regarded as one of the more challenging traffic bottlenecks in Lake County.
"I feel sorry for people who make that commute," said Carol Calabresa, a Lake County Board member from Libertyville.
After more than a decade on the shelf, widening the last major stretch of the heavily traveled state route appears to be a go because Lake County is footing the $32 million bill.
But as is usually the case with road projects, the eventual benefit will come with inconvenience.
This project, which includes widening for more than two miles north to Route 120, building an underpass or overpass to connect two trails near Casey Road and expanding the Milwaukee/Route 137 intersection to include a right-turn lane and second left-turn lane at every corner, will be a two-year tangle.
And though the work won't be bid until June 2011, with construction to begin later next summer, there is plenty of interest in how the details will come together.
Property and business owners in the area will get a preview Tuesday from the Illinois Department of Transportation during the Libertyville village board's streets committee meeting.
"We've asked them to come and provide us with a presentation of what the impact is going to be," said John Heinz, the village's public works director.
"It's a great project but it's impossible sometimes to do a project without a hardship for some."
Heinz said the meeting is timely in that property owners are starting to get letters from IDOT regarding buying land or negotiating easements.
"All I've asked them (IDOT) to do is have open ears. We don't need to start this thing off on the wrong foot," he added.
Business owners like Ted Bond Sr., of T.J. Properties Inc., who owns two units in the Adler Park Plaza center about a quarter mile south of the intersection, plan to attend.
"They're taking 14 parking spaces away from us," he said, to straighten a slight bend in the road.
Bond said he was told Milwaukee Avenue will be moved about 25 feet west to reconnect with the existing road at Finstad Drive, the southern boundary of the project.
Because the intersection will be so much bigger, the current road alignment to the south needs to be adjusted, according to IDOT.
Owners will be compensated for the lost parking but Bond questioned why the road needs to shifted, as it was resurfaced last year.
"It doesn't make any sense. To me, it's just a prime example of government waste," he said.
Just west of the intersection, Rick Laskowski Jr., the vice president of operations for the Ace Hardware store, has several questions regarding timing and other details.
"The meeting next week will be very interesting," he said.
Besides widening Milwaukee Avenue, an 18-foot wide landscaped median will be installed and sidewalks will be added at intervals on either side of the road north of Route 137.
A traffic signal with equestrian crossing is planned at Casey Road. And just south of Casey, an underpass or overpass will allow for the connection of the Libertyville Township trail with the Lake County Forest Preserve District's Des Plaines River Trail.
"It's been on our regional trail plan since 1989 showing a connection but it's been tied into the Milwaukee improvements which were delayed and delayed," said Mike Fenelon, the district's director or planning, conservation and development.
The project is possible because county officials intend to issue $32 million in bonds, backed by a regional sales tax increase approved more than two years ago, to pay for the work.
"This will be a huge, huge timesaver for people," Calabresa said.