The door on Orland Park’s industrial might may be closing, but another door, to additional residential development, is opening.
Officials in the southwest suburb are weighing a proposal to build high-end new housing on a 100-acre site that Andrew Corp., a bastion of the business community for decades, is leaving.
The suburb also is well on the road to realizing a long-held dream to create a town center that will be a pedestrian-friendly mix of condominiums, plazas, parks and mixed uses.
The hustle and bustle, hatching of plans and sense of excitement created by such opportunities could hardly have been imagined when Orland Park was first settled by German immigrants as a quiet farming community in the mid-1800s. By 1900, when its first official census was taken, Orland Park, which was incorporated in 1892, had just 366 residents.
Today there are about 57,000 people and more are likely to come as the community continues to add new housing, shopping, another Metra train station slated to open in mid-2006, and expanded train service.
The village envisions its population will eventually reach 75,000. The decision of Andrew Corp. to relocate from Orland Park has left its campus on 153rd Street between 104th and 108th Avenues open for redevelopment.
The company, a global leader in communication systems and products, is relocating to two Chicago-area locations. One in Westchester will be its corporate headquarters; another near Joliet will be a cable products manufacturing site.
“We really hate to see them leave,” Orland Park Mayor Daniel McLaughlin said recently. “They’ve been a good corporate citizen over the years, supporting numerous community activities.”
Although the specifics–building style, number of units, and size–of what will be constructed on the Andrew site have not been finalized, it is expected to be a mix of single-family homes and townhouses, said Bill Purcell, president of Kimball Hill Suburban Centers, the company that has a contract to buy the property.
The village still needs to review and approve the proposal, but Purcell anticipates that the company may begin construction in June or July.
Purcell said his company is envisioning putting single-family homes that would cost from $400,000 to more than $500,000 on the north side of the property.
“They [the houses] will be consistent with the other single-family houses in the neighborhood,” he said.
Kimball Hill has submitted plans for the development to the village, Cook County and other units of government. It expects to go before the suburb’s Plan Commission shortly, said Sonya Hene, who is in charge of acquisitions for the home builder.
The townhouses are expected to anchor the south side of the property. A price range for the townhouses has not been determined.
Getting the chance to redevelop the Andrew campus was appealing to Kimball Hill for several reasons.
First, it’s difficult to find 100 buildable acres in any of the Chicago area’s in-demand suburbs these days. And the site’s topography was largely untouched due to its years as a corporate campus with rolling green lawns and other amenities.
“It’s a beautiful site. It’s not flat. That provides opportunities for us to incorporate some really cool design features. And it has a 14-acre lake that will remain,” Purcell said.
Train service on doorstep
It also is well located, within walking distance of one of the village’s Metra stations at 153rd Street. The village, along with Kimball Hill, wants to see residents walking to and from the train station rather than using their cars.
Purcell said the developer will try to mesh the best of both worlds: a suburban residential development that has amenities usually available only in the city.
“It’s a dynamic area that’s going to be a combination of an urban-suburban setting,” he said.
Train service to Orland Park also will be upgraded, beginning immediately.
“Metra will go from 16 to 30 trains a day,” said Bob Sullivan, the village’s director of planning.
Easy access to a train station is the focus of another large development project under way in the village. A new brick Metra station is under construction at 142nd Street and LaGrange Road and is slated to be completed by mid-2006. The Metra station will be one of the highlights of a 20-acre, triangular-shaped property which the village is calling the Main Street Triangle.
“The idea is to build a downtown with a town square, a railroad station, a mix of uses. We want to create a lively, pedestrian feel,” said Sullivan.
The village foresees a quaint district with low-level buildings, an historic feel, and a small scale that will be a gathering place for residents, shoppers and anyone else who wants to experience Orland Park.
Naperville’s busy downtown is a model for what Orland Park would like to see.
“Naperville’s scale is so much bigger,” said Sullivan. “But we’d like some of the same elements. We hope ours will be charming and interesting, but on a smaller scale.”
Elements in this district, which is roughly bordered by LaGrange Road on the east, 143rd Street on the south, and the Metra tracks/Southwest Highway on the west, would include primarily brick buildings that would contain condominiums, retail and commercial space. It would have a small park and plazas, ornamental streetscaping, and striking views of nearby natural areas.
One of the attractions of this planned town center is already in place. It is Orland Park Crossing, a high-end mixed-used retail center that features Ann Taylor, Chico’s, Coldwater Creek and high-quality restaurants.
Downtown district backed
Patrick Zomparelli, a Realtor for Re/Max Team 2000, who has worked in the village for 17 years, says he supports the creation of a downtown district.
“There are already some nice businesses there [Orland Park Crossing]. And it’s all tied together [in look]. The mall has the same lights as the train station and the landscaping is similar,” he said.
The east side of Orland Park Crossing is where Palatine-based Concord Homes has recently started construction of 85 townhouses in a development that will have a nearly identical name: Orland Crossing.
Located at the northwest corner of 143rd Street and LaGrange Road, the townhouses will have two to three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, finished lower levels, and attached two car garages.
“There’s a high demand for new construction town homes in Chicago’s southern suburbs. And there is a need for residential developments that are pedestrian-friendly,” said Jim Vanderploeg, president of the infill division of Concord Homes.
This downtown district of which the town homes “is going to be a neat little area,” Vanderploeg said. Construction of the townhouses will begin in February. Their cost will range from the mid- to upper-$300,000s, he said.
Vanderploeg expects the market for the townhouses to consist primarily of young couples and people who are scaling down.
“I think there are plenty of buyers out there who want amenities and they want maintenance-free living. They want to downsize, but they want to do it graciously,” he said.
Rita and John Deane are empty nesters who downsized when they moved from Oak Forest to Orland Park.
“There are a lot of positive things going on” in the village, said Rita Deane. “There is shopping [in Orland Park], restaurants and golfing nearby.”
They originally purchased a townhouse in Colette Highlands, a new development at 108th Avenue and 159th Street. They put it on the market and purchased a ranch-style, maintenance-free house at another new community, Southmoor Country Club, 9411 Banbridge Ct. It includes a 9-hole golf course, walking paths, rolling terrain and prices starting at $293,000.
“We have seven grandchildren. We decided a ranch design would be more convenient for us,” said Rita Deane.
High-end amenities that include media rooms and three-car garages are increasingly in demand by buyers looking in Orland Park, according to Zomparelli. New homes in the area range from about $400,000 to $2.5 million.
Although $2.5 million for a custom home is on the high end of the scale, it’s not unusual now for new single-family houses in Orland Park to be in the $500,000 to $700,000 range, Zomparelli said.
Someone looking for an older house, say a 30-year-old, three-bedroom ranch, can expect to pay about $240,000, he said.
Change, as much as it may be a good thing, has consequences.
“The problem now is that it’s hard to find an affordable home in Orland Park,” he said.
