Shopping center proposed for Lincolnshire corridor

Lincolnshire's booming commercial corridor will feature even more stores, restaurants and other attractions under a plan unveiled Thursday.

Chicago-based Centrum Properties wants to build a multi-building complex on the southwest corner of Route 22 and Milwaukee Avenue. To be called the Lincolnshire Collection, it would be set at one of the village's most heavily traveled intersections.

Preliminary architectural plans -- reviewed during an architectural review board meeting -- call for freestanding buildings that would house a grocery store, a theater, restaurants, a health club and clumps of stores. Parking would be located throughout the nearly 20-acre complex, which could have a decorative fountain plaza near its center for concerts or other public events.

The now-vacant land, which is currently zoned for office buildings, borders the sprawling Lincolnshire Corporate Center. It's centrally located within a long stretch of popular shopping centers.

Two retail and restaurant complexes that neighbor each other on Milwaukee Avenue are about a half-mile to the south: Lincolnshire Commons and City Park at Lincolnshire. Those sites, which flank Aptakisic Road, include the Wildfire and Red Robin restaurants, a Barnes & Noble bookstore and other retail outlets.

The land also is south of the Village Green plaza, which is on Milwaukee Avenue at Route 45. It's home to Flatlander's Restaurant & Brewery, an Einstein Brothers bagel shop and other well-known tenants.

Additionally, the corner isn't far from the site of the long-planned Lincolnshire Marketplace center, which has been proposed as a downtown commercial district for the village. That property is east of Milwaukee Avenue near what once was Riverside Drive.

Centrum first came to village leaders with a shopping-center plan for the site in 2006, but the new proposal is scaled down. The initial plan called for taller buildings and parking decks, but the decks were eliminated because of retailer concerns, a Centrum representative said.

Moving ahead would require tax incentives or another form of subsidy from the village, the Centrum representative said.

The plan got a mixed response from the architectural board members and village trustees in the room. Trustee Liz Brandt was pleased to see a grocery store included, but other officials criticized the overall design, layout and parking scheme.

Trustee David Saltiel suggested that if the proposed center isn't special or a point of community pride, the land should be left vacant.