'Road Diet' Eats at Patience of Residents

Skokie has been experimenting with a “road diet” over the past few weeks along Oakton Street in an effort to increase customer traffic for its downtown businesses. Though it is too early to note the commercial results, what it has definitely done is raise the ire of some residents who live near the roadway.

At last week’s village board meeting, residents expressed their frustration over the road diet to trustees, claiming the extra traffic is not worth the cost and the project is doing more harm than good.

Jim Abbate, a resident of Skokie for 15 years, said at the meeting that after a while, motorists have turned to the side streets to avoid Oakton. “This creates more traffic and noise for the local residents,” he noted.

The road diet test is the village's attempt to ease vehicular traffic on Oakton between Long to Lacrosse avenues, create wider sidewalks and additional parking spaces for local businesses that have been struggling. The project is similar to one that Wilmette has used along Green Bay Road.

The six-week pilot project started in May and is expected to conclude next week.

The plan is a byproduct of a 2009 market study by a Vernon Hills-based traffic engineering firm, which looked at ways Skokie’s central business district could be enhanced. One recommendation was altering traffic patterns.

“One of the things they did was that they found people were concerned about the traffic zipping by them,” said Peter Peyer, director of community development for Skokie.  “The downtown atmosphere for pedestrians wasn’t that friendly.”

As part of the project, Skokie officials are conducting research on traffic counts and signal timing with the goal of aiding Oakton Street, which is dotted with many empty storefronts.

“We are testing before and after traffic patterns to see how the traffic is being diverted,” Peyer said. “We are also doing speed tests to see the speed of the traffic flow through downtown.”

The current effort has temporarily created 30 additional parking spaces. But if a permanent road diet were implemented, there would be 60 more spaces, better sidewalk amenities such as more seating areas and the possibility of eating establishments to have outdoor dining.

With the project looking more like a construction zone as orange traffic cones line Oakton, Peyer concedes the majority of the reaction has been negative. But he also says many people acknowledge it is a temporary situation and Oakton will be back to normal by the end of June.

“People are taking it in stride,” Peyer said. “They realize it is a lane change for now, but it might change again in the near future.”

Peyer notes eastbound rush-hour traffic on Oakton has been bad compared to the westbound flow, and he is not sure why there has been a difference.

The results of all the studies won’t be known until later this year. But whatever the village learns, that will not ease the concerns of some residents.

“It is too much traffic on Oakton Street and Park Avenue,” said Maria Otil, a 20-year resident of Skokie who lives close to Oakton. “There are a lot of fumes from the cars, trucks and buses back up. I’m home every day and I see the traffic every day.”

Abbate said he understands that the village wants to invigorate business, but he is not sure it is necessary to block off traffic. “I just don’t see there is a need for it in these hard economic times, with so many stores being vacant,” he said.

Abbate added Skokie is different than other towns because its central business district is not the main shopping area for the village.

“Other communities don’t have the extra shopping that Skokie does,” he said.  “There is shopping eight blocks north on Dempster [Street], eight blocks south on Touhy [Avenue] and then you have Old Orchard [Mall], so there is a lot of shopping for residents.”