City set to redevelop 5 miles of Western Avenue into green, pedestrian-friendly neighborhoods

Mayor Lori Lightfoot’s administration is ready to implement a long-term vision for a thoroughfare that connects North Side neighborhoods like Lincoln Square, North Center and West Rogers Park.

City planning officials held the final meeting Thursday night for their Western Avenue Corridor Study, an effort to transform the 5-mile stretch from Addison Street north to Howard Street.

It’s one of Chicago’s busiest streets, but daunting for pedestrians and cyclists, and has too many empty storefronts, according to Department of Planning and Development Commissioner Maurice Cox.

During the virtual meeting he said the city should help develop a series of “15-minute neighborhoods” along Western Avenue, dense collections of new housing at prominent intersections, including affordable housing, along with better public transit and street design, ensuring residents can quickly and safely reach new retail and public amenities.

“Every resident should be just steps away from the amenities every resident expects and deserves,” he said.

The Western Avenue plan was written after nearly a dozen focus groups with residents, business owners and other stakeholders, along with several public meetings with hundreds of participants. It’s supported by all four aldermen who represent the area, and the Chicago Plan Commission will likely approve it at its Nov. 17 meeting, Cox added, who also wants to launch similar efforts for other streets with similar problems.

“We expect this will serve as a planning tool for commercial corridors citywide,” he said.

But residents should not expect a flurry of new housing to rapidly sprout near Western Avenue. Unlike Lightfoot’s INVEST South/West initiative, where the city dictates the pace of development by soliciting proposals from builders for projects on the South and West sides, typically on city-owned lots, most of the land along Western Avenue is privately owned, so planning officials will shape proposals as they are put forward, according to Katharyn Hurd, the city planner who led the 18-month initiative.

“If a developer proposes a zoning change, we will want them to comply with the recommendations of the plan,” she said. “As we are reviewing these projects, we will be referring back to this document.”

Hurd said planners identified the five Western Avenue intersections likely to attract the most development, including Lawrence Avenue in Lincoln Square, Devon Avenue in West Ridge and Byron Street in North Center. Along with the local aldermen, they will encourage developers to create high-density housing near the intersections, including ground-floor businesses such as banks, pharmacies, salons and restaurants, as well as wide-open sidewalks to help pedestrians feel safe.

Outside the main intersections, the city can use tax increment financing, or TIF, funds to help small businesses renovate existing properties or establish new services and retail such as coffee shops and laundromats.

Lincoln Square is already attracting the type of development Hurd and other officials envision. The city’s Community Development Commission last month approved up to $12 million in TIF funds to help finance a new 63-unit affordable housing complex at 4715 N. Western Ave., now a parking lot. The $35 million development by The Community Builders will include about 5,000 square feet of ground-floor retail.

But the city doesn’t have to wait to make Western Avenue safer for pedestrians and cyclists, Hurd said. Officials can also use TIF funds over the next two years to shorten the four-lane street’s crossing distance with refuge islands and curb extensions, among other infrastructure improvements, such as adding green spaces with trees and shrubs, and public gathering spaces. Along with planners from the Chicago Department of Transportation, which collaborated on the plan, they will also study ways to slow down traffic, add new bus stations, bus lanes and protected bike routes.

“It needs to be more friendly to pedestrians, less hostile than it is right now,” Hurd said.

Ald. Debra Silverstein, 50th Ward, who represents a northern section of Western Avenue, asked Cox to create the new strategy, and said the 18 months it took to write is just the first step.

“It’s not over,” she said. “We’ve got to turn this vision into reality.”