The four-way interstate interchange at Grand Avenue in Gurnee that loads and unloads hundreds of thousands of visitors each year could become even busier.
Besides being the destination for Six Flags Great America and Gurnee Mills, the city soon might sport a hotel and convention center complex at the intersection.
Gurnee, Six Flags and Chicago-based Prism Development Co. could become partners in the development, to be built on 135 acres of vacant land on the west side of Interstate Highway 94 north of Washington Street opposite the theme park, which is on the east side of the interstate.
The property is owned by Time-Warner Inc., parent company of Six Flags, and is zoned for commercial development. Several proposals for the site have been offered in recent years, but all have fallen through, village officials said.
The current proposal, which is in the early planning stages, was presented at the first meeting of a 26-member blue ribbon committee appointed by Gurnee Mayor Richard Welton to study the market feasibility of the project and to gather input from residents.
Five components would be incorporated into the site plan, including a destination resort, a retail and restaurant area, a small theme park, an events center and an employee housing facility to be used primarily seasonally for the summer work force at Six Flags.
Only the events center might require public funding, officials said. All other components would be financed from the private sector, said Hal Coxon, a spokesman for the project.
The proposed 10,000- to 12,000-seat events center probably would be run by a civic authority involving representatives of the community, as well as investors and other interested parties, such as minor league sports teams, Coxon said.
Until the Resort at Illinois Beach State Park reopened earlier this year, only Marriott’s Lincolnshire Resort provided a full range of amenities to convention and meeting planners in Lake County, Gail Svendsen, president of the Lake County Convention and Visitor’s Bureau has said.
“I think the market is here, but I’m taking a wait-and-see approach just like everybody else,” Welton said. “I want to see how the residents respond to the proposal by Prism as it develops.”
No dollar figures, schedules or detailed site plans have been determined, Coxon said.
According to zoning for the site, the consortium could build as much as 4.6 million square feet of space, about twice the size of Gurnee Mills.
That, Coxon said, will not happen.
“Prism (is) committed to a village concept for the site,” Coxon said, “where everything is walking distance from everything else and buildings are limited to a maximum height of two to 2 1/2 stories.”
About 25 acres of the site is covered by wetlands and cannot be developed. Plans call for developing a maximum of 40 percent of the remaining 110 acres, Coxon said.
Earlier this year, the Waukegan Sunrise organization offered a similar plan to build a hotel and convention center near Waukegan Harbor, a few miles east of the Gurnee site.
That lakefront version would concentrate on attracting business from nearby large corporations, such as Outboard Marine Corp. and Abbott Laboratories.
“I think there’s room in the market for both centers because they’re two different animals,” said Waukegan Ald. Ray Vukovich, whose ward includes the harbor and downtown. “There’s a big difference between a million-dollar view overlooking Lake Michigan and looking at the Tri-State.”
