A controversy erupted at a recent Zoning Board of Appeals meeting when a small but vocal group of residents objected to a conceptual plan for the construction of a drugstore.
Walgreens proposes to build a store on a 1.5-acre site at the southwest corner of U.S. Highway 14 and McHenry Avenue, a heavily trafficked area.
Neighbors said the added traffic a drugstore would attract is unacceptable and they circulated a petition to halt the project.
“We would view this as an opportunity to actually improve this intersection,” argued John McLinden, senior vice president of Centrum Equities Inc., developer of the plan.
Toward that end, McLinden proposed reducing the number of curb cuts from the seven on the site to two, and placing them as far from the intersection as possible.
Along with that change, a five-foot right-of-way would be donated to the city to use for a right-turn lane for McHenry Avenue.
By restricting the entrance and exit on McHenry Avenue to right turns only at peak hours, traffic flow would be improved, according to McLinden.
