Rolling Meadows council hits brakes on Kirchoff ‘road diet,’ orders traffic study first

A split Rolling Meadows City Council decided to temporarily halt conceptual plans for a so-called “road diet” of a key thoroughfare through the center of town so that a traffic study can be done first.

Controversy over the proposal to trim down a milelong stretch of Kirchoff Road — from five lanes to three — held up adoption of the rest of a corridor planning study the elected officials said they otherwise agree with.

Council members voted 4-3 Tuesday night to postpone approval of the 110-page Kirchoff Road Corridor Study for at least two months. The decision came two weeks after they advanced the plan in a preliminary 6-0 first reading vote.

Since then, business and property owners along Kirchoff led by Craig Carlson, owner of Comet Frozen Custard, lobbied city hall to remove the road changes from the planning document. They argue that reduced traffic volumes would keep customers from their establishments and force the businesses to leave town.

“As business owners, we need traffic,” Carlson said. “You can’t get a banana split online.”

City staff, who commissioned a consultant to do the study, contend a reduction in lanes would calm driving speeds where more than half of drivers exceed the 35 mph speed limit. It could also could improve safety and reduce the frequency of accidents involving vehicles, bicycles and pedestrians, they say.

Under the envisioned reconfiguration, Kirchoff — which currently has two lanes in each direction and a turn lane in the center — would be altered by removing an eastbound lane and a westbound lane, and replacing them with on-street parking spaces in the commercial area. Protected bike lanes would be nearest to the curbs.

Parkways would be expanded in lieu of on-street parking in front of single-family homes further east on Kirchoff.

Alderwoman Jenifer Vinezeano, who represents Ward 4 that borders Kirchoff to the south, said a narrowing of the road would redirect vehicles onto side streets, which are already heavily used during dismissal time at Rolling Meadows High School on Central Road. She also raised concerns about the potential for traffic brought on by future redevelopment to the north in Arlington Heights by the Chicago Bears or another developer.

“We have no idea what’s coming to Arlington Park. I understand that maybe we don’t have the traffic count right now. But we have no idea what the future holds in five years,” Vinezeano said.

Alderman Nick Budmats said there’s parts of the Kirchoff study he doesn’t like, but argued that a vote on the plan isn’t a commitment to the road project. And he said the ideas presented in the document would go a long way toward residents’ long-sought desire for more businesses in what had been the city’s traditional downtown.

The city has struggled to market and sell two properties it owns along the corridor, including the shuttered Fire Station 15 that is next door to the Comet custard stand.

“Our constituents … are asking for restaurants to go to. They’re asking for something as an attraction,” Budmats said. “And I can’t provide that when we have properties we can’t sell because developers come to us and say, ‘We’d love to buy it, but where are our customers going to park?’”

Vinezeano and fellow council members Stefanie Boucher, Mike Koehler and Kevin O’Brien agreed to delay endorsement of the full Kirchoff study so that a traffic analysis including morning and evening rush hour counts could be conducted over the next four to six weeks.

Budmats — along with Karen McHale and Mandy Reyez, who were on the Kirchoff plan steering committee — voted no.

Though she didn’t get a vote, Mayor Lara Sanoica questioned whether the delay could jeopardize the potential for Cook County grant funding for phase one engineering design of a potential road project. Such a study would include a traffic analysis, she said.

Boucher called such an approach “backward.”

“I don’t understand why I’m asked to make a permanent decision for the city knowing I have to vote and then I get the data. That’s cart before the horse,” Boucher said. “I should have the data, and then I can make an educated decision.”

Cost of the independent traffic study will be about $20,000, officials said.