A funding plan contingent on whether Lincolnwood gets a small slice of millions in grant money the state has put up for grabs for transportation-related municipal projects would help the village of Lincolnwood finish the walking path in Centennial Park.
The Lincolnwood Village Board is expected to approve an application on June 7 that asks for $240,000 in funding from the Illinois Transportation Enhancement Program (ITEP), a $29 million fund allocated by the Illinois Department of Transportation to help communities expand their infrastructure as it relates to transportation needs.
If approved, the grant would fund 80 percent of the total $300,000 price tag the village estimates it will cost to build a 10-foot wide recreation path along the west side of Centennial where the path that runs from Touhy Avenue to Pratt Avenue tops. The project would extend the path all the way to Devon Avenue, according to Andrew Letson, assistant to the public works director.
Trustees during the Tuesday Committee of the Whole meeting agreed the village would cover the remaining 20 percent of the project—$60,000—with local funding.
“(The resolution to be approved on June 7) will be to commit local funding to say that if the grant is awarded, the village is committed to funding the rest of the project,” Letson explained.
In their decision to apply for the single grant, trustees turned down a second offer that had been recommended by the Park and Recreation Board to also ask the state for $156,000 in ITEP funds for a bicycle path plaza that was proposed for a section of the Valley Line Trail, a one-mile path currently under construction between Jarvis and Devon avenues.
That recommendation was struck down because its proposed location just north of Jarvis Avenue falls into the village limits of Skokie, meaning the two towns would have had to file a joint-application seeking the funds.
The plan for the bike path plaza showed a rest area with benches and bike racks. Skokie hadn’t responded an attempt from Lincolnwood to gauge their interest in the project as of the May 17 Committee of the Whole meeting, according to village manager Tim Wiberg. That uncertainty turned some Trustees off, including Larry Elster.
“I’m a little concerned about it because it looks nice, but it’s not a necessity,” Elster said.
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If the state approves the village’s grant to finish the bike path, it would be built about six to seven feet away from the curb bordering traffic-heavy McCormick Boulevard, a distance that would still be close enough to the new street lights that were installed between Pratt and Devon avenues last year, Letson said.
The current shape of the path on the west side of McCormick—which in some places curves away from the visibility of the street—makes some pedestrians hesitant about using the path in the dark, according to Wiberg.
“At night there was no lighting back there,” Wiberg said, “but the thought now was that we have street lights on that section of McCormick, so people might feel safer using it.”
Two other mile-long bike paths—one stretching from Devon to Jarvis avenue and the other between Devon and Touhy avenues—are expected to be open by the fall. Those bikeways are expected to cost a combined $2.034 million, with 80 percent covered by Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality grants, according to the village.
Natalie Hayes is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.