Grant program to fund transportation projects
Cook County to distribute $8.5M for initiatives including bike path extensions, street repairs
Hundreds of thousands of dollars in grants for projects such as bike paths and road repairs are coming to the south suburbs through Cook County’s Invest in Cook program.
Chicago Heights, Calumet City, Harvey and Park Forest are among the largest grant recipients. The program is administered by the county’s Department of Transportation and Highways.
The county will issue $8.5 million in grants, which will supplement federal, state and local transportation program funds, according to the county, which said that 70% of its funding is directed toward projects in lowand moderate-income communities.
Chicago Heights will receive $478,000 for reconstruction of a section of Euclid Avenue, north of 26th Street to the Canadian National Railway tracks, that has severely deteriorated, according to the city.
Bordered by homes on the east side, the west side of Euclid is home to Esmark Steel Group and ALCO Spring Industries and the section of Euclid being renovated carries 100 or more large trucks daily, officials said. Work will include installation of curb and gutters, which should improve stormwater drainage, they said.
“Rebuilding Chicago Heights’ infrastructure of streets, sidewalks, sewers, and lighting has been a key pillar of creating a 21st century economy for the city that helps attract new business investment,” Chicago Heights Mayor David Gonzalez said in a news release.
Work is expected to start next spring, Gonzalez said.
Country Club Hills will receive $800,000 to rehabilitate 183rd Street between Cicero Avenue and Pulaski Road including repairing structural failures in the concrete roadway, according to the county. The city is underway with a project 183rd and Pulaski that includes new traffic signals and drainage improvements.
Harvey will receive $420,000 for construction of bike and pedestrian connections linking University of Chicago Medicine-Ingalls Memorial Hospital at Wood and Dreesen streets with the Harvey Transportation Center at Park Avenue and 154th Street. The hospital is the city’s largest private sector employer.
Next to one of Harvey’s Metra stops, the transportation center is a transfer point for several Pace bus routes. Work will include installing a dedicated bike lane along 154th Street, according to the county.
Metra received $500,000 for rebuilding the 115th Street/Morgan Park station on the Rock Island Line’s Beverly branch. The project will replace a temporary shelter that was put up after the original station burned down in May 2017. Two gravel parking lots will be replaced with asphalt lots with concrete curbs and lighting, according to the county.
Park Forest will receive $480,000 for design and engineering work for improvements along Forest/Norwood Boulevard from Indianwood Boulevard on the south to Western Avenue on the northeast, according to the county.
The village has identified Forest/Norwood, which provides a direct connection between Western and downtown Park Forest, as a priority route for a bike path.
Expanding Richton Park’s bike path network is a goal of the $414,000 construction grant the suburb received, according to the county. The Poplar Avenue bike trail starts at the village’s Metra station at Governors Highway and Sauk Trail, extends west through the village and ends at Cicero Avenue. The extension will run north along Cicero into Matteson and connect with the Old Plank Road Trail, according
to the county.
Richton Park is finishing an engineering study on the path extension that was funded in part with a previous Invest in Cook grant, according to the county.
Sauk Village is receiving $300,000 for a feasibility study for a potential expansion of the Old Plank Road Trail, which at the east end halts in Chicago Heights. An extension could potentially link the trail with the Pennsy Greenway trail in Schererville, Indiana, according to the county.
Other communities and agencies are partnering in the potential extension, including Chicago Heights, Ford Heights and Lynwood on the Illinois side, Schererville and Dyer on the Indiana side, the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning and the South Suburban Mayors and Managers Association.
Posen will receive $200,000 for rebuilding sidewalks to comply with the federal Americans with Disabilities Act, according to the county.
Work will focus on sidewalks along 143rd and 144th streets between Western and Harrison avenues, where conditions make pedestrian travel difficult and unsafe, according to the county. The area is near the village’s main park as well as three elementary schools.
University Park will use its $150,000 grant to study making the stretch of Steger Road-University Parkway near Interstate 57 more functional for freight and residential traffic, with heavy truck traffic anticipated in at the intersection with Central Avenue in light of massive warehouse/distribution projects that sprung up in recent years.
Amazon’s 1.1 millionsquare-foot project is on Central north of Steger Road, and another 1 million square feet of warehouse-distribution development is planned at the intersection within two years, according to the county.