The Elgin City Council received a long-awaited traffic study Wednesday that urges the city to invest $50 million during the next 20 years to build new bridges and roads and widen some existing streets.
Council members did not comment on the report, written by consultants it hired in 1989. They are expected to discuss it at their next meeting Feb. 13. Elgin`s population in two years has mushroomed from 69,000 to 77,000, city officials said. That means more houses, more roads and more cars which add up to more traffic headaches.
The consultants, Donahue & Associates of Schaumburg, have been studying development in Elgin and the impact of Sears, Roebuck and Co.`s relocation to nearby Hoffman Estates. They have devised ways the city can avoid massive gridlock that has gripped other northwest suburban communities.
While roadways in Elgin are handling the extra vehicles now, city officials say it is crucial that they prepare for the year 2010, when the population is expected to reach 95,000.
Most of the new housing developments in the city are being built west of the Fox River, said City Manager Larry Rice. But the majority of jobs, he said, are east of the Fox River, causing traffic problems on the five bridges connecting east to west.
Donahue & Associates recommended the construction of a new bridge over the Fox. The four-lane bridge would link Illinois Highway 58 (Golf Road) with Big Timber Road on Elgin`s west side.
”We need an additional crossing to take the load off our existing five bridges,” Rice said, noting that the Kimball Street bridge is the most overloaded.
The new bridge would carry about 38,000 vehicles a day by the year 2010, the consultants said in a preliminary report in August. They also said a proposal to expand the Kimball Street bridge-discussed as an alternative to the new bridge-would be physically impossible.
A similar proposal to build a new bridge from Big Timber Road to Congdon Avenue was defeated in referendum five years ago. But the latest proposal, according to the consultants, should not generate such controversy because the bridge would not displace a neighborhood.
Donahue & Associates recommend the creation of a north-south roadway between Illinois Highways 59 and 25.
And the consultants say the city should widen many arterial roads, including Shales Parkway, Highway 25, Dundee Avenue and Big Timber Road, from two to four lanes.
The construction projects would cost about $100 million, Rice said. Elgin`s share would be $50 million, he said, with the state, county and federal governments paying the rest.
Rice said the city would finance the construction projects through property taxes. The expanded tax base created by the city`s population boom should avert a serious tax increase to property owners, he said.
”We are getting the growth, which is creating the need for the construction,” he said. ”The construction will be paid for by the additional property taxes that result from that growth.”