Once-sleepy Kane and Kendall Counties are undergoing the same type of dramatic population growth that has made Aurora and Naperville the third- and fourth-largest cities in Illinois.
Village leaders in the growing communities say good housing values, lower crime rates and less congestion are spurring exurban growth, but regional planners give a simpler explanation.
“Housing growth tends to occur just outside the ring where the job growth occurs,” said Thomas Marc, an associate planner with the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission. “There are a lot of jobs in DuPage County and in the Fox River Valley. They are not going to Chicago to go to work. That’s why they are living there.”
The population boom is most evident in Sugar Grove, just west of Aurora, and in Oswego, south of the city. But it’s also affecting Montgomery and North Aurora, which border Aurora to the south and north, and Yorkville, the Kendall County seat west of Oswego.
The growth, which mirrors the trend in western DuPage County in the 1980s and early 1990s, has brought not only new homes, people and businesses, but also the need for expensive infrastructure and municipal agreements to define boundaries not contemplated in earlier decades.
In Sugar Grove, which projects its population of about 3,300 to more than double in the next 10 years, the Village Board recently approved up to $290,000 in engineering contracts to oversee about $4 million in sewer rehabilitation and installation projects.
The village also anticipates spending $1 million to connect to the Fox Metro Water Reclamation District and $1 million within 20 years to acquire land for a new Fox Metro sewage treatment facility south of town.
The city staff also has begun reviewing annexation agreements with two developers. Those projects, which could get under way next year, could add 1,193 units to the village’s housing stock.
To pay for the estimated $6 million in sewer projects, $4 million of which will be financed with a low-interest state loan, Sugar Grove is considering a water and sewer rate increase, said John Morris, village administrator.
Sugar Grove also is discussing a boundary agreement with Aurora, which now has about 125,000 residents and expects to reach a population of about 148,000 by 2010 and 183,000 by 2020. Aurora, in turn, is discussing boundary agreements with Oswego and North Aurora, a community with which it is engaged in a border war over development of an auto mall.
Oswego recently was determined to be the second-fastest growing Illinois municipality on a percentage basis, behind Lake in the Hills in McHenry County, with more than half of about 10,500 residents arriving in the last five years, said Village President Budd Bieber.
Bieber said about 2,000 additional housing units are in the works, and each is expected to attract an average of 2.8 residents in the next 10 years. Meanwhile, Inland Realty is considering a 600-acre development that would be the village’s largest ever, he said.
“We just did a water study for a population of 100,000 people,” Bieber added. He noted the village recently spent $5 million to double water delivery capacity and $2 million to expand sewer capacity. The costs will be paid through some of the higher fees charged to developers in the region.
Oswego is negotiating border agreements with Montgomery, Aurora, Naperville and Plainfield. Bieber said the village is struggling to maintain its “small-town feel,” a battle that so far has been successful.
Montgomery has seen its population grow from about 4,500 in 1990 to about 5,180 now. The village is considering an annexation and development that would add 395 houses and 375 town homes on 241 acres at the village’s southwestern edge.
It would be the village’s largest housing development ever and probably would spur additional growth, said Village Administrator John DuRocher. To handle that growth, the village plans to levy a 5.15 percent utility tax and is mulling higher annexation fees.
North Aurora, where the population was about 6,000 in 1990, now has a population of about 9,150. Additional developments comprising more than 360 housing units are being considered there.
One of those developments, on the village’s northern edge, led to a lawsuit filed by Batavia claiming North Aurora violated a boundary agreement by trying to annex land north of the two towns’ designated boundary.
In recent years, North Aurora has spent $2.9 million to upgrade its water delivery capacity, which led to higher village water fees.
Aurora, which in 1992 opened a $40 million water filtration plant, anticipates spending another $15 million in the next two years to expand its capacity.
Yorkville, farther from established suburbia than the other growing towns, saw its population increase from about 5,000 in 1994 to about 6,200 today, said City Administrator Jim Nanninga.
The city is considering developments that could add 580 new housing units, he said. By 2010, Yorkville projects a population of about 12,700 people, he said. Nanninga attributes the growth to low crime rates and the absence of traffic congestion.
“We see a lot of people come here from Naperville because of traffic,” he said. “We see a lot of people from Aurora concerned about crime.”
Montgomery’s DuRocher, who said some planners think the metropolitan area one day will extend west to DeKalb, thinks exurban pioneers are looking for a bucolic setting.
“They are just trying to find a little bit more of the country or a less urban setting,” he said. “The cost of housing is a lot less here than it is in Naperville, for instance.”
North Aurora Village President Mark Ruby, however, agreed with the assessment of Marc from the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission.
“I have a feeling a lot of people moving out here aren’t working in the city,” Marc said. “They have suburban jobs.”
