Naperville may shed light on Route 59 improvements
Naperville must decide if it wants to spend about $1.5 million to install lights along a soon-to-be-improved stretch of Route 59.
The Illinois Department of Transportation recently estimated the city will be responsible for between $1.2 million and $1.7 million for the improvements made to Route 59 between Aurora Avenue and Ferry Road.
With roughly $2.9 million left of the nearly $4.6 million the city budgeted over the next two years, city officials must now decide whether they want to light that stretch of Route 59, estimated at about $1.5 million.
IDOT will pay for lighting Route 59 from north of I-88 to Diehl Road but no lights are planned from Diehl Road south to Aurora Avenue.
“The good news is that even though it’s so early in the process, we budgeted conservatively and are unlikely to go over budget, even with the light installation,” City Manager Doug Krieger said. “Now the council just needs to hear the facts and decide if they want to go forward with the lights. I believe IDOT is waiting to hear from us on this issue.”
About 20 percent of the frontage between Diehl and Aurora is located in Aurora but Aurora officials have already declined to share lighting costs, according to a Naperville memo, which also states Aurora officials believe “heavy spillover lighting from the adjacent parking lots” would provide sufficient lighting for that stretch.
The same city memo also cites national studies that have “consistently shown that street lighting reduces accidents by approximately 25 percent.”
Krieger said it is customary for Naperville to light its improved arterials. The state also has proposed concrete noise abatement walls with a stone impression, similar to the face of the Main Street Bridge. But city officials are still researching the aesthetics and maintenance that would come with such a project.
The Route 59 renovations, scheduled to start this spring or early summer, will give the road three through lanes in both directions and dual left and right turn lanes at the major intersections.
Council members are expected to discuss the lighting issue March 6.