Bright spots of economic development are shining from closer-in suburbs, farther-out ones and those in between, in other words, just about everywhere in the area.
One bright spot comes in a close-in Cook County suburb, where there is a plan for a 32-acre shopping center development in Hillside on the south side of I-290 and Mannheim Road.
The plan is particularly intriguing because village was the site of a the trend-setting Hillside Shopping Center in the 1950s, one of the nation’s first and a much-remembered shopping destination for Boomers as children. The site now includes Car Max, Menards and First Bank.
John T. Flood, Jr., the director of economic development for Hillside, noted that shopping center in his village was later outdone by other newer developments such as Yorktown Mall, Oakbrook Center and Woodfield.
But now plans for the new site in Hillside include what Flood called a large anchor tenant (which has not been announced yet), a hotel, restaurants, a bank and what he called mid-level boxes (stores which have also not been announced).
Site work has begun and heavy construction is expected to begin during the first part of 2008. The main entrance will be off Mannheim at Harrison Street.
“This is the biggest economic development in Hillside since a shopping center opened in the 1950s,” Flood said. “I hope to be able to make an announcement with the names of particular businesses by the middle of the summer. I anticipate a 130-room hotel and the anchor tenant using 135,000 square-feet of space.”
Another close in suburb, Elmhurst, is looking toward a very large development. The new Elmhurst hospital, estimated to cost about $470 million, is being planned for the south side of the City.
“This is the granddaddy of them all. It is huge,” noted John Said, the city’s director of economic development, planning and zoning. “That may well be the largest project ever built in Elmhurst.”
(The Business Ledger ran a front page story recently about plans to go from the existing hospital on 11 acres in the central part of the city to 27 acres next to the 15 acres being used by the Center for Health, an outpatient facility of the hospital on York Road north of Roosevelt Road.)
In a farther-out northwest Cook suburb, Schaumburg, another large project has been built and is expected to have the most impact since the Woodfield Shopping Center, which has 2.7 million square-feet and more than 300 stores and 15 restaurants, opened in 1971 and 1972.
“The Renaissance Hotel and Conference Center which opened in July 2006 with 100,000 square-feet on the exhibit floor and 48,000 square-feet of meeting space, will have a huge impact on Schaumburg and the surrounding area,” said Matt Frank, economic development coordinator for the Village. “It will help sustain economic development for the 21st century the way Woodfield has done in the 20th century and will continue to do.”
More developments in the works include the five-story, 139-room Cambria Suites by Choice Hotels at the southwest corner of I-90 and Roselle Road and the six-story, 166-room Hilton Garden Inn at the southwest corner of Woodfield Road and National Parkway.
Frank said those two developments will raise the number of hotels to 25 and the room count to 4,436. Also, many more restaurants are being opened.
In another northwest suburb, Hoffman Estates, a renewal is taking place for another large area, the 780 acres where Sears was located in the early 1990s.
“Village officials listening to the marketplace really sparked a renewal for the whole area as hotel and retail spaces were planned,” said Gary Skoog, economic development director.
“The economy had gone south and the office market soured,” he said. “The land sat pretty idle for well over a decade. But now developments are being built.”
The Sears Centre, which opened in October 2006, is an 11,000-seat indoor arena for concerts and 9,000-seat venue for sports events. Commitments have been made for a professional hockey tem, soccer, an indoor football team and a National Lacrosse League team. An estimated 135 events per year are expected to bring 750,000 people per year to the area.
Also proposed for the area is the Sun Island Resort and Conference center, a development on 22 acres to be constructed just south of the Beverly exit off I-90. The planned structure will be almost 500,000 square-feet, more than 100,000 of which will be an indoor/outdoor water park. A hotel will include about 450 rooms. A small conference center will cater to area businesses seeking meeting and conference space.
Another proposed development will include memories of the past.
The proposed Prairie Creek Amphitheater is a new outdoor facility (seating 9,000) that will be located within the Prairie Stone development in Hoffman Estates. It’s within view of the site of one of the country’s most successful amphitheaters, Poplar Creek, which closed in 1995. The new facility will be approximately one third the size of Poplar Creek.