Public Comments of Oct. 23, 2007
La Grange Plan Commission
Hearing on Proposal for La Grange Place

Orlando Coryell, 115 S Spring Ave

For 20 years our family ran a business, first on Burlington, next to the fire station, and then on Calendar Ave.

One of the things that we found out very quickly was that we didn't have any business on Thusday mornings.

Why? There was traffic court in a room on the second floor of the fire department. All the parking was used up. People weren't going to walk a block, so they just ignored coming to our store on Thursday.

I think about the taking away of parking on La Grange Rd, on the west side, [which was a recommendation made by a traffic engineer hired by the Village]. That is going to damage those retail businesses, and they won't be able to recover from that damage because there won't be parking. Yet we're going to benefit on the other side [of La Grange Rd, where the proposed project would be located].

I just want to make sure that everybody is balancing out the fact that somebody is going to get hurt, other people are going to benefit.

Again on parking, at the Triangle [development south of Ogden Ave], I have been physically there at noon time and have seen people on the east side of Triangle, where Trader Joe's is, driving around and around. They can't find parking and leave, not coming back. There are lost sales because there is inadequate parking.

As I understand it, the Village recognizes that now, so when you look at those ratios to the type of retail there versus the type of retail that might be in this development, we should take into consideration that this parking is inadequate today.

The other thing is that the developers have proposed that the people who are going to live in this apartment complex are going to be from 24 to 44 years old. You cannot compare that to buildings in which the population is 55 to 65 or older. There is a different attitude on driving at those ages. People who are younger would want more cars, so parking is needed more for the younger than it is for the older.

The other thing that came up was that the YMCA traffic tended to be non-rush-hour related. They had programs in the morning, but it was usually after rush hour, in the afternoon before rush hour and in the evenings. So the traffic that the Y had appears on the surface to be substantially different than the traffic that this new development is going to generate.

The last thing I'd like to bring up is the corner retail. I mentioned the fact that we moved [our business] from Burlington to Calendar. We did a lot of searching for spaces here in La Grange. The ease of parking was very, very important.

We found out through all the studies that I have done, working with other retailers, that that corner [where the project would be situated] is very, very difficult to drive into. If you are coming south off La Grange Rd north of Ogden, and you want to make a left turn to get into that retail store [proposed for the] corner, I don't know how you are going to make it. And the same if you want to make a left turn from Ogden, after you go east of La Grange Rd.

It might be good as a destination-type of shopping in which people are going to be willing just to go there, and that entire space can be worked out. But I think maybe the developer should drop retail and make this Y property all residential.