A last-ditch effort by bird lovers and others to stop construction of a 14-story Carvana glass tower next to Skokie’s Harms Woods forest preserve failed to take flight Tuesday night after the Skokie Village Board voted 6 to 1 to give the company the zoning relief it had been seeking.
Emotions ran high during the Feb. 22 meeting, during which residents lined up and spent nearly two hours pleading with the Village Board to reverse a preliminary vote it took on the project two weeks ago or to delay the final vote. Every speaker spoke against the proposal.
Carvana has built such glass towers around the country, usually located in commercial areas, to sell used cars.
Many residents said they fear the 14-floor glass curtain wall of the Carvana tower, planned for the 9800 block of Woods Drive next to the forest preserve and near the Illinois Holocaust Museum and Education Center, will be a “killing machine” for birds that fly into it. However, Mayor George Van Dusen noted the village is requiring mitigations to prevent such bird strikes.
Residents from the nearby Optima condo complex also said light from the tower will flood the area at night, vehicle delivery trucks coming and going will create a noise nuisance, the building could lower property values in the area and the sales and property tax revenue promised by Carvana are not realistic.
“If that tower is built, it is going to become a symbol for doing the wrong thing,” Skokie resident Janet Ginsberg told the board, her voice cracking with emotion.
“And that it is a vending machine for cars, which is about as tasteless a thing as you can imagine, just makes it that much worse,” she said. “As for Carvana, this is a slimy company from start to finish. They are mired in lawsuits all over the country.”
Carvana had been seeking zoning relief from the village to build the vertical used car dealership in what is currently zoned as an office research district, and to also allow the company to display more signage than is currently permitted. In voting in favor of the Carvana tower, some trustees have said the village could receive around $9 million in tax revenue from the project and that another much larger building could be constructed on that site without zoning relief. The Skokie Plan Commission also signed off on the project.
Van Dusen commented that the village has worked with Carvana to reduce bird strikes.
“We have listened to what the scientists and what the experts have advised,” he said. “The mitigations on this project are as strict as anywhere else in North America. That includes Toronto, San Francisco and Portland, Oregon, the three that have the strictest bird mitigation in the country. We did that without an ordinance.”
Indeed, Carvana has over the last few months made changes to its plan to address concerns by altering the route trucks will take coming to and from the building, reducing delivery hours and agreeing to treat the glass exterior with decals to reduce bird strikes and to dim lighting at the site.
And during a Feb. 7 Village Board meeting, the company also agreed to Trustee Edie Sue Sutker’s request that the interior and exterior lights on all four sides of the glass cube tower be turned off from March 15 to June 15 and from Aug. 15 to Nov. 15 each year between midnight and 7 a.m. when birds are typically migrating through the area.
But some residents also said that regardless of bird strikes, it is insensitive to allow the tall glowing glass tower to be constructed only a few hundred feet from the Illinois Holocaust Museum & Education Center at 9603 Woods Drive, a site one resident described as “a solemn area.”
Skokie resident Jay Parker urged residents to remember the board vote during the next municipal election.
“I’m not going to try and sway any of you because I can see in your faces the decision is already made,” he said to the board. “Instead I’m going to turn to the constituents. People, an election is coming. Remember tonight. Remember these faces and the adolescent response they gave you and make your decision based on that.”
Many said they were surprised the Village Board gave Carvana the zoning relief it was seeking despite such strong community opposition to the tower.
“I find it striking once again that every single person, without exception, that has spoken here tonight has spoken against this proposal,” said Lori Kaplan, a resident who formerly worked for the village. “Clearly the feelings of the community are against it.”
“When the community expresses itself so clearly and so unanimously and the board and the mayor disregard all of that eloquence and all of those facts, it’s a dreadful feeling to feel that the representatives that you trusted do not represent the citizens. That’s the only conclusion that we can sadly come to after two meetings, so many emails, so many petitions.”
