The city is starting a grant program intended to alleviate some of the financial problems tied into the ongoing downtown construction projects, but frustration remains regarding both the scope and the pace of the renovation.
Just after the start of the new year, the city launched a long-planned streetscape improvement project on Deerpath Road, intending to enhance the appearance of the main downtown east-west street. However, the facelift required extensive restrictions for both pedestrian and vehicular traffic. For several weeks now, Deerpath has been closed to vehicles between Oakwood and Western Avenues and that is expected to remain in place through the end of October, when the entire project is scheduled to be finished.
In June, the city started a refurbishment of the narrow Bank Lane, from Deerpath north to Southgate. Once again, vehicular access was closed and pedestrian access was limited. The depth of the project has limited the ability for people to access the businesses.
Lake Forest/Lake Bluff Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Joanna Rolek spoke of the challenges many businesses are facing due to the construction at the July 7 City Council meeting.
“The spontaneous traffic is not there because you don’t have people just walking by through this,” Rolek said. “So that is a difficulty.”
To provide some compensation to the affected businesses, the Lake Forest City Council approved the creation of a business disruption grant program.
“We really are very sensitive to the situation that we have put you in,” Mayor Stanford “Randy” Tack said. “This is a once-in-a-generation project that will ultimately greatly enhance the location of your businesses, but we realize that we are creating suffering for businesses in the area. We know that we can’t make you whole, but we would like to do what we reasonably can to keep you in place until things are better.”
The city authorized $250,000 for the program, where the maximum grant will be 50 % of the sales tax revenue lost between January 1 and October 31, 2025, compared to the same period last year for the individual business.
The businesses must contain street frontage or primary access in the affected areas of Deerpath or Bank Lane, and the maximum grant will be capped at $11.650, according to city documents.
The city has started accepting applications from businesses for the grant program, and the window will be open through the end of the year, according to City Manager Jason Wicha
If an eligible business opened after January 1, 2025, the maximum grant amount will be the greater of 50 % of sales or $5,000.
Up to 22 businesses will be eligible for funds, according to city spokeswoman Dana Olson.
Allison Gurza, the owner of the Sage Explorers toy store on Bank Lane, was pleased the city was offering the grant. However, she wasn’t sure if the grant amount would fully address her situation, as she is not certain whether her business would have grown without the construction.
Mark Roberts, the owner of Mark David Designs on Deerpath, labeled the grant program as a “nice gesture,” but also wasn’t sure the amount would equal the amount of lost revenue, lamenting how the ongoing renovation continues to negatively impact his business.
“You are working through an open construction site. Lake Forest people – especially older people – they are scared of that and with good reason,” Roberts said.
There was some hope that business would increase once many residents returned to the area who might live elsewhere in cold weather months. But Roberts stated that was not the case.
“It has gotten worse because it has become harder to access the stores and the businesses because you are literally walking around an open job site,” Roberts said. “That does scare most people and it is not a very clean job site either.”
Another business owner, Crystal Gambill of Lux Lane, a women’s clothing store, launched her latest business earlier this year at the intersection of Bank Lane and Deerpath and is frustrated.
“It’s a hot mess out there, it looks like a war zone,” she said.
Gambill stated she was not aware of the Bank Lane project when she opened up in February. She added, however, city officials have been providing regular updates over the past few months.
Besides advocating for the grant program that the City Council unanimously approved, Tack called on downtown property owners to consider temporary rent abatements for the businesses at the July 7 meeting.
“I think that would go a long way to getting us to the end of this,” he said.
Todd Altounian, whose family business owns many of the buildings in the construction zone, said after the meeting he would entertain that idea.
“My rent income is not going to change because of the enhancements,” Altounian said. “But our goal as a landlord in town is to take care of our tenants and make them flourish and our successful. We are open to helping our tenants as well as the city.”
In another aspect to the rehabilitation, some questions are being raised about the pace of the construction, believing it can be done faster, and there are times they see little construction activity in the area.
“If you set an 11-month deadline for a project that (should be) five to six months, of course, you are going to have days when there is no one is working and you are going to be on time,” Roberts said. “But there should be progress and there is not.”
Lake Forest Superintendent of Engineering Byron Kutz maintained that the repair is progressing on time.
“We understand it may look like there’s not much activity on certain days, but that’s actually part of the carefully planned sequencing of the project,” he wrote. “Each phase – like electrical, underground utilities, or concrete – needs to be completed before the next one can begin. While you might only see a few people working at a time, a lot is happening behind the scenes to order, review, and procure materials so they’re ready for the next stage.”
Kutz told the City Council in July pace of the construction is expected to pick up soon. Yet he added there would be some new hurdles coming up with the Western Avenue and Deerpath tentatively scheduled to be completely closed between August 7 and 24 as crews remove and replace the existing crosswalks. Kutz said that aspect was timed so that it would be between the Lake Forest Day festivities on August 5 and 6 and the start of the 2025-26 school year.
He added that a similar project is tentatively slated for about two weeks in September at the intersection of Deerpath and Oakwood.
Daniel I. Dorfman is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
