La Grange Park officials are taking steps to ease chronic parking problems in the 31st Street business district.
By a 4-2 vote, the La Grange Park Village Board recently approved the purchase of a property at 1024 Newberry Ave. where a public parking lot is planned on a lot directly behind a row of businesses including a cafe, antiques shop and dentist office. The purchase price is $383,900, to be paid from the village’s 31st Street/Barnsdale Road Business Development District funds.
The village for years received complaints about spillover parking in the neighborhoods adjacent to the 31st Street business district. Although officials implemented permit parking in some areas and added some parking spots on Beach Avenue north of 31st Street, problems persisted.
“Despite these efforts, the village has continued to receive residents’ concerns over the years about parking overflow into residential areas, particularly during peak time,” Trustee Jermaine Stewart said while introducing the measure.
A parking study commissioned last summer showed the area had sufficient parking, but village staff have observed that large Saturday events often pushed available parking to near full capacity.
People who live in the area made it clear that there was a problem.
“It’s just been chaos,” resident Cheryl Peterson told board members last week. “There’s people who’ve been parking in front of a hydrant … it’s nuts.”
Dave Zacharko noted that the problem was long-standing.
“We’ve been dealing with this for 17 years,” he said.
Nate Fritz thought the idea of a new parking lot on the property was a good one, but suggested further measures.
“There’s no security cameras at the current parking lot,” he said. “If we’re going to add 15 more spots, I would say that I would like to see a little bit of allocated resources for a few security cameras just in case.”
Trustee Jamie Zaura said she was considering more permit parking in the area, but said the new lot would be a good hedge for future business growth in the area.
“We don’t really know what’s going to happen with the businesses in that area,” she said. “I am in favor of this.”
Trustee Bob Lautner said opportunities like purchasing 1024 Newberry didn’t come often.
“This is the beginning of a project that gives us a lot of options I think going forward,” he said.
Trustees Mike Sheehan and Karen Koncel had other concerns and provided the dissenting votes.
Sheehan noted that he had supported the project previously, but pointed out that the total cost of the project, including demolition of the existing house and constructing a parking lot would be close to $1 million, stressing that the money might be better spent on combating the recent wave of residential burglaries.
“In light of the fifth break-in in a month,” he said, “I would much rather for some of it … to go toward increasing the police department.”
Village Manager Julia Cedillo said the funds for the purchase would come from Business District funds, which “would not be available for law enforcement.”
Sheehan countered that the purchase price came out of Business District funds, but the rest would come out of village funds.
The next La Grange Park Board of Trustees meeting will be 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, Nov. 26 in the Village Board Room, 447 N. Catherine Ave.
Hank Beckman is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.