Roughly 700 acres of land at Ivanhoe Farms along Route 60 in unincorporated Mundelein could be turned into a major housing and commercial development after the Wirtz family — which owns the Chicago Blackhawks — has proposed a project to the village.
The Mundelein Village Board will consider a proposal by the Wirtz family to annex the land into the village at its Dec. 12 meeting.
Village Administrator Eric Guenther said that if the property is annexed, the owners could access resources like sewer and water services by being a part of the village, rather than having to find alternative options if it remained unincorporated territory.
“There are lots of reasons why a property owner would annex into a city’s city limits, and that’s one of them, so they have decided that’s what they’d like to do,” Guenther said. “That doesn’t mean they have to do anything with their property, quite honestly.
“They could leave it, they could farm it, they could do whatever they want to and it’s up to them,” he said. “They just have indicated to us that they choose to look at a development on their property.”
The Wirtz family has owned the massive parcel for more than 150 years, according to Ivanhoe Nursery and Farms’ website and Wirtzcorp.com.
Michael Wirtz, great-great-grandfather of Blackhawks Chairman Rocky Wirtz, settled on the land, which belongs to Fremont Township, after immigrating to America from Germany in the 1850s.
If the proposal gains board approval, Guenther said, “There’ll be some rather lengthy discussions as we put together a planned unit development or PUD for the area, which is basically the development agreement and all of the stipulations and regulations that go with the development in and of itself.”
He estimated that the process could take as long as two years to gain full approval and break ground on construction, calling it a “pretty big deal for the village of Mundelein.”
“It will take time to create this development and see it all the way through,” Guenther said. “This is years in the making, but it certainly sets course the future of Mundelein, for sure.”
Attempts to reach representatives of the Wirtz family were unsuccessful.
Guenther said that regional and nationwide demand for additional housing extends to Mundelein.
“There’s not enough supply to meet the demand that’s out there, and it doesn’t matter if you’re in Palatine, Chicago, Mundelein, or wherever,” he said. “That’s a consistent issue.
