Will County Public Works & Transportation Committee Met Jan. 5.
Here is the minutes provided by the committee:
I. CALL TO ORDER
II. PLEDGE OF ALLEGIANCE TO THE FLAG
Mr. Cairns led the Pledge of Allegiance to the Flag.
III. ROLL CALL
Chair Joe VanDuyne called the meeting to order at 9:04 AM
| Attendee Name | Title | Status | Arrived |
| Joe VanDuyne | Chair | Present | |
| Sherry Newquist | Vice Chair | Present | |
| Herbert Brooks Jr. | Member | Present | |
| Mica Freeman | Member | Present | |
| Donald Gould | Member | Present | |
| Jim Moustis | Member | Present | |
| Frankie Pretzel | Member | Present | |
| Tom Weigel | Member | Present | |
| Denise E. Winfrey | Member | Present |
Also Present: N. Palmer
IV. APPROVAL OF MINUTES
1. WC Public Works & Transportation Committee - Regular Meeting - Nov 5, 2020 9:00 AM
| RESULT: APPROVED [7 TO 0]
MOVER: Herbert Brooks Jr., Member SECONDER: Jim Moustis, Member AYES: VanDuyne, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel ABSTAIN: Newquist, Winfrey |
VI. NEW BUSINESS
1. Discussion Regarding Gougar Road Grade Separation over CN Railroad – Village of New Lenox - County Board District #12
(Jeff Ronaldson)
Mr. Ronaldson stated this is Gouger Rd., County Highway 52; the location is by Lincoln-Way West High School I have included an aerial view in your packet. It will give you a since of where the railroad crossing is; it is south of Rt. 30 for those who are familiar with the project area. The memo spells out some of the history as far as the Highway Department is concerned. A while back when they acquired the EG&E Railroad; some money was given to the city of New Lenox to preside with the Phase I design; for a possible grade separation for this location. This is to provide a crossing over that railroad; because there are no other crossings for quite a while along that stretch of railroad. As past County Engineers have decided that our focus as the IDOT would be is on the corridor itself; as our 20 year plan shows. The Village is taking that money to try and focus on a grade separation; as the memo says we have been helping with reviews and approvals as they moved along that process for the Phase I; as I said they are near completion. The Village will be speaking shorty to give you a little more information on where the grade separation is. The grade separation cost about $35 million to proceed further to construction our corridor is about $35 to $40 million our focus again has always been the corridor. Now that we are at the end of Phase I the grade separation is very important to the Village. They met with my staff and me along with CMAP to discuss possible funding solutions for that grade separation. There are a lot of grants out there that could be acquired over time. There are three questions that I need direction on as we move forward. One is will the County consider partnership with the Village in some form or fashion whether it be funding or taking the lead. What is the will of the committee on the priority of this project? Two if the grade separation does go in; we need to come to an understanding on who will maintain that structure. The Railroad of course should be involved; they participated in a certain amount of dollars to the Phase I project. I am not aware that they have committed anything further to the Phase II or construction. If that does move forward we might look to Board Members and to whatever contacts you might have to apply a little pressure to come to the table and participate in this. At this time there is no funding in our current Transportation Improvement Program (TIP); which was approved last July. We are working on our new TIP that I will bring to you in May; if there is consideration there that we need to look at. I will need to know ahead of time so I can see how that might work out. With that I will turn it over to the Village of New Lenox.
Kirk Carrol stated I am the Village Administrator for the Village of New Lenox. I am joined by Robin Ellis our Assistant Village Administrator also from our consulting firm HR Green we have Shawn Ladue and Russ Logan. They will answer any technical questions you may have. I just want to highlight a few things; as he stated we are looking today to make a request for a partnership; obviously the lead would have to be Will County. As Mr. Ronaldson stated a little over a decade ago Canadian National (CN) acquired EG&E Railroad. As part of that negotiations with them the communities negotiated about a half a million dollars that would go towards the study or would go toward the study and or have funded the majority of the Phase I study of a potential overpass. Our biggest concern was there is a seven mile gap between underpasses at LaGrange all the way to Chicago St. Every roadway between LaGrange and Chicago St. is at grade. Moving emergency vehicles and traffic between there has been a concern from day one. As we have seen over the decade that they have been here CN has done quite well and have already blown away their 20 year projections of where they thought they were going to be. We know that there are more trains coming. Everybody wants their goods to get to them; but they don’t want to have trucks come through there; that’s not reality. What we are looking for is a regional solution that would help New Lenox; but what we are really looking for is an overpass that ties into the Counties plans. You’ve already been investing and moving forward with the widening of Laraway Rd. and Gouger Rd. Obviously we appreciate that the County has already recognized with the growth of the area; not only from residents as we’ve seen but also more importantly the increase of truck and trains that are coming through. The counter each other and do not work together; we are looking for something to combat that industrial growth that we have. We don’t want all of the truck traffic to come through New Lenox but we do realize it is coming; whether we like it or not it is on its way. We have our friends over on Briggs St; they don’t want all of the traffic coming through their way; same with Mokena and Frankfort don’t want it their way as well. This would give grade separation so that the traffic moving through can get through; that not only helps our residents but also helps the businesses that are trying to move the projects that help pay the bills in this County. One thing we are looking for is a huge dollar amount $35 to $38 million. Obviously we are not asking the County today for that. Our consultants from HR Green work with Tom Murtha from CMAP. He believes there are a number of ways to cobble some funds together that can greatly reduce the cost to the County and the Village; with funding that has paid for other overpasses in the state. He thinks the vast majority of funding can be paid by other sources. But we have to get into the que; if we don’t get in today we are going to miss opportunities. We have concerns about the trucks that are coming through; we are adding to it ourselves we know we have industrial areas. But, we also have safety concerns; the County built a nice building for the County Police and they are south of the railroad tracks. We also have Silver Cross Hospital that we are very proud of; we want the people throughout the county to be able to get there safely and quickly in emergency situations. What we are looking for is to help this regional issue and find a way to potentially reduce all of our cost. Both Laraway and Gouger Rd as potentially improving the County transportation we think this would be an added step that would benefit all of us in the region.
Mr. Weigel stated I think the County should take the lead on this; by trying to get Federal Funding either from CMAP or whatever sources are available. There is a lot of traffic coming off of I-80 going down to Gouger Rd. and also goes south to Laraway Rd to the industrial park. I think we should participate as much as possible through grants from the Federal and the State or from other sources. This should be a priority for us.
Ms. Newquist said I know from my experience out here in Eastern Will County that the CN use to be a nightmare with traffic situations. We have the same thing in Park Forest and Chicago Heights. What would an initial commitment look like from the County; would it be to commit money to a Phase II plan? Or is it us looking for grant opportunities; I am just not sure what we are being asked to do here at this point.
Mr. Carol stated at this point we are looking for applications to get into the grants; we are not looking for any funding at this time. We are finishing up Phase I engineering; we had the initial amount the Board in New Lenox just approved some additional funding to complete that Phase I. That this a huge step for applying for other funding sources. The County has been very much a part of all of our conversations; but we have been in conversation with Canadian National throughout. They have been supportive of this in fact they want to put in another siding; because if this does happen they want to include that. But of course they have not volunteered any money but they are supportive going forward.
Mr. Brooks asked if this is a resolution for us to vote on; if so does this move this to the next step.
Mr. Ronaldson stated this is just a discussion there is no resolution; my department just needs a direction as to be if we going to move this forward. The only other comment that I would add is if we chase down the federal dollars we will need to have something in place to move it forward. If we move forward with a Phase II design it will come back.
Mr. Pretzel said I agree with Mr. Weigel that the County should take the lead on this; it is defiantly necessary.
Mr. Moustis stated this was a hot topic when CN took over the railroad and we knew they were going to go from two trains a day up to 40 a day. How many County roads have a situation where they have grade crossings? I would be interested in going forward with the one on Gouger first; but would be interested to see if there are any other grade separations that you feel would be warranted as a long range plan.
Mr. Ronaldson stated there are only a few locations were we have railroad crossings to be concerned about. Briggs St does but that is a very hard place to put one in; the CXS on Crete Monee did apply for and received grant money for that. That is kind of in the works but CSX hasn’t moved forward; that was a grant that they sought after even though we were in the lead; bit they are the ones funding it completely. We can look at other locations but none come to mind at this time. This one is listed as one of the top 47 priorities for CMAP they recognize it as being very important to the region. If we move forward we might need assistance with the Railroad and get them to the table; the Village has been talking to them. As Mr. Carrol said they haven’t volunteered money but if they are putting in a siding they are adding to the impact. We need to figure out a way that they could either put in money or be responsible for the up keep of it. Those are the things we need to iron out.
Ms. Winfrey said I don’t have any objection to this I think it is a good idea; for the grant applications if any of them turn out to be matching funds; you will be coming back to us asking to put some money aside for the match in the event that we are approved.
Mr. Ronaldson said yes but we would have to get several grants to make that viable; if we get one big one I would probably come back and move forward with Phase II and maybe there is some agreement to talk dollars and cents to come back to you on that. I would say we should put some money aside in the next TIP for Phase II just so that it is in there.
Ms. Winfrey asked with our next conversation with CSX will be in order to get the grade they are going to have to put some money on the table; maybe they put up at least ½ of the match; would that be our conversation?
Mr. Ronaldson said that is something we can approach them with.
Mr. Van Duyne stated I see no other hands and that was a good discussion; Mr. Ronaldson I think you have direction on the subject. Thank you ladies and gentleman from New Lenox for showing up.
2. Authorizing an Intergovernmental Agreement between the Village of Mokena and the County of Will for Placement of License Plate Reading Cameras Located on County Highways in the County of Will
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Tom Weigel, Member SECONDER: Herbert Brooks Jr., Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
Mr. Wise stated in 2004 the County received a dedication of a 60 foot strip along Will Center Rd. The problem is that two sister owned the property; only one of the sisters joined in the dedication so we have basically a 50% dedication. The sisters subsequently deeded those two properties to two different people. One in 2004 and one in 2009 and last year one of the new owners put a fence within that 60 foot strip. We now have a situation on a piece of property that is either ours or it isn’t. If it is ours we don’t want a fence for liability reasons; and since we only really have 50% my recommendation is that we simply abandon the whole attempt to dedicate. I think under the circumstances that’s the eaiser way to reduce the Counties liability than to try to track down whether or not these sisters are still alive; they were in their 80’s back in 2004 when this happen. I don’t think we can ever get the other 50%; we can’t build a road on it with only half of the dedication. This is just a way to limit the Counties liability. One day if we ever have plans for widening the road we will just have to condemn what we need.
Mr. Gould asked when we received that interest in 2004 the County didn’t obtain a title policy insuring the dedication.
Mr. Ronaldson stated that is correct.
Mr. Gould stated maybe we should have a policy in the future for any land donation or dedication we have.
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Sherry Newquist, Vice Chair SECONDER: Herbert Brooks Jr., Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Sherry Newquist, Vice Chair SECONDER: Donald Gould, Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Jim Moustis, Member SECONDER: Tom Weigel, Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Jim Moustis, Member SECONDER: Tom Weigel, Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Jim Moustis, Member SECONDER: Tom Weigel, Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Donald Gould, Member SECONDER: Herbert Brooks Jr., Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
(Jeff Ronaldson)
| RESULT: MOVED FORWARD [UNANIMOUS] Next: 1/21/2021 9:30 AM TO: Will County Board
MOVER: Donald Gould, Member SECONDER: Herbert Brooks Jr., Member AYES: VanDuyne, Newquist, Brooks Jr., Freeman, Gould, Moustis, Pretzel, Weigel, Winfrey |
VIII. DIRECTOR OF TRANSPORTATION DISCUSSION
IX. STATE'S ATTORNEY DISCUSSION
https://willcountyil.iqm2.com/Citizens/FileOpen.aspx?Type=15&ID=3943&Inline=True
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