A Chicago civic group has crafted a vision for the region with much to admire: fewer hours stuck in traffic, a convenient public transit system and affordable housing closer to where people work.
The alternative, according to Chicago Metropolis 2020, is less open space in the next 30 years and regional gridlock.
But details of the group’s plan, released earlier this month, could be potholes in the road to its implementation.
Suburban officials say Chicago Metropolis 2020 ignores the good planning that has been done in the region–for example, the decades-long effort by some suburbs to revitalize their downtowns by encouraging higher-density housing. Many suburban officials also oppose the group’s recommendation that some communities share sales-tax revenue with other towns.
“We still have some concerns about certain parts of their report,” said Rae Rupp Srch, village president of Villa Park in DuPage County and a member of the boards of two of the area’s regional planning agencies. “The sales-tax sharing issue is a biggie.”
Suburban officials also are likely to resist any suggestion that cities and villages give up control over planning and zoning issues.
“I don’t think that is going to happen in my lifetime,” said state Sen. Steven Rauschenberger (R-Elgin), who chaired a state task force that issued a report last year on growth issues.
Rauschenberger said lawmakers and other public officials understand that planning reforms are needed. But he added, “It would be difficult in Springfield to build political support for a move to take zoning away from municipalities.”
The not-for-profit Chicago Metropolis 2020 was created in 1999 by the Commercial Club of Chicago, an influential business group. In the early 1900s, the Commercial Club commissioned architect and planner Daniel Burnham’s visionary Plan of Chicago.
The latest report, “The Metropolis Plan: Choices for the Chicago Region,” was inspired by Burnham’s efforts, but the issues now facing the area may be more complex–in part because the population of the region is larger and more dispersed.
In 1910, the year after Burnham’s plan was published, there were 2.7 million people in the six-county area–2.2 million of whom lived in Chicago.
The 2000 census put the region’s population at more than 8 million, with nearly 5.2 million people living in suburbs or exurbs.
Population forecasts suggest the region will add 1.6 million to 1.8 million residents by 2030.
Figuring out where those people will live and how they will commute to work without further clogging roads are issues that private groups such as Chicago Metropolis 2020 and public agencies, including the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission, are confronting.
The Chicago Metropolis 2020 plan, which has no official status, supports redevelopment of Chicago’s South Side and calls on the state to steer new jobs and infrastructure money to the area’s regional cities, including Elgin, Joliet, Aurora, Schaumburg, Naperville and Waukegan.
The plan opposes a proposal to extend Illinois Highway 53 into Lake County and recommends higher highway tolls during peak hours.
It also calls for a better fit between the area’s transportation system and land-use policies, which means more apartments and condominiums near commuter train stations.
Frank Beal, executive director of Chicago Metropolis 2020, said some suburbs foster a housing market with zoning restrictions that prevent builders from meeting the demand for higher-density residential development.
One of the group’s recommendations calls for the merger of planning and transportation agencies–including the Northeastern Illinois Planning Commission, the Chicago Area Transportation Study, the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority and the Regional Transportation Authority, as well as the Chicago Transit Authority, Metra and Pace–into a new Regional Growth and Transportation Commission.
Last week the Illinois House approved legislation that would set up a regional transportation task force to study the possibility of creating a super-agency.
Some suburban officials worry that merging the agencies would result in an unmanageable bureaucracy. But state Rep. Carolyn Krause (R-Mount Prospect), one of the chief sponsors of the legislation, said the idea needs serious study.
“We will wind up in a state of permanent gridlock unless we step back and look at all the government agencies charged with managing transportation issues in our region,” Krause said.
If the measure is approved by the Senate and signed into law, the task force would report its recommendations to the legislature by Nov. 1, 2004.
Chicago Metropolis 2020 says its plan would protect 300 square miles of open space from developers and save $3.7 billion over the next 30 years in the cost of building roads and sewers.
“What we’re saying is that the region needs to start planning,” Beal said. “Our plan is an aspiration.”
