Pulte proposes 66-unit townhouse development in Lisle

The homebuilder behind a new residential subdivision in Lisle wants to develop a townhouse community to the east of the former Family Square, an empty shopping center at the gateway to the village’s downtown.

Pulte Homes Co. envisions 66 townhouses spread across 14 buildings. Plans also call for setting aside a parcel — less than a half acre — for future commercial development along Ogden Avenue at the north end of the site. A public hearing on the project is scheduled to continue Wednesday, Dec. 3.

“Locally, Pulte has seen success at the Estates at Rivers Edge,” attorney Eric Prechtel said of the new subdivision off Route 53. “They’re looking to really expand upon that success.”

Pulte is now looking to redevelop a collection of parcels less than 3 miles away.

Under Lisle’s downtown master plan, the properties are part of a “Downtown Core Expansion” area. The plan suggests townhouses should be encouraged east of Center Avenue as a means of expanding housing options for the community and bolstering the downtown population to support its businesses.

A previous redevelopment proposal included an apartment building on the west side of the site along Spencer Avenue in addition to nearly 60 townhouses. Bridge Street Properties, however, withdrew that zoning petition to allow time to secure an end developer for the project.

The existing parcels contain a collection of old single-family homes as well as a vacant drive-through bank. The site is “very much transitional in nature,” Prechtel recently told the village’s planning and zoning commission.

Bridge Street has since revised the project plans, removing the multifamily component. Now the proposed redevelopment — dubbed Arbor Station — exclusively features townhouses to be built by Pulte and ranging in size from roughly 2,200 to 2,800 square feet.

Several planning and zoning commissioners have questioned if the proposed lot on Ogden Avenue is big enough to accommodate a future commercial development.

“One of the ongoing themes of Ogden in terms of development has always been that the lots are too small and they’re not deep enough, and the last thing I think we want to do is create another small lot that remains vacant or is not suitable for redevelopment,” said MaryLynn Zajdel, the commission’s chair.

“While Downtown Lisle can boast a number of successful restaurants, existing vacancy and prevailing rental rates in the commercial core simply don’t justify new commercial development in a tertiary location,” project documents state.

Beyond those market conditions, the property is “not desirable for commercial development because there is no continuity to the primary commercial core, visibility is poor, and vehicular access is circuitous due to one-way westbound traffic on School Street.”

Each three-story townhouse would include a two-car garage. Pulte also intends to offer an option to build out a habitable attic space with an outdoor terrace, creating livable space on the fourth floor of a townhouse unit.

One of the last major residential developments in downtown Lisle was before the pandemic: Marq on Main, a five-story apartment complex on the former village hall site at the corner of Main Street and Burlington Avenue.