IDOT Interstate Connector News

Aurora Beacon-News
February 4, 2002

Western Kane residents know how to protest, win

BEACON NEWS STAFF

When folks in Big Rock, Kaneville and other parts of western Kane County organized to fight the outer-belt highway corridor, they didn't have to go far to contact fellow fighters.

They could let their fingers do the walking.

That's because most people there probably already had plenty of names in their phone books, address books, Rolodexes or Palm Pilots from past fights.

It seems that, for the last 10 to 15 years or so, western Kane County residents have been fighting this and protesting that ó taking up the cudgels against proposals they fear would destroy their part-rural, part-estate-lot way of life.

And for the most part, residents have been successful in their battles.

Here is a list of some major projects western Kane County residents have organized to fight during the last 15 years:

The El Paso Merchant Electric peaking plant at Lasher and Daubermann roads in Big Rock Township. Plans for this are in the Kane County planning pipeline, and residents are fighting it on the basis that it is an inconsistent use in an otherwise farm area and that it has the potential to pollute the air. This battle is ongoing.

The Union Pacific Railport during early 2000. Planned for land bounded by Route 38, Howard and Meredith roads, near Maple Park, the railroad wanted to build a depot where freight train cars unload their goods onto trucks for over-the-road hauling.
Residents won this one when the plan was killed after intense opposition from people in the area, as well as government resistance led by Kane County Board Chairman Mike McCoy and eventually crystallized by, ironically enough, Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.

Also ironic is the fact that one of the fears raised by people in 2000, during the railport fight, was that it would add more steam to the engine driving plans for an outer-belt highway. Now, people opposing the outerbelt are fearful the highway will rekindle the flames of railport support.

The Superconducting Super Collider, also known as the SSC, during the late 1980s. This project, tied to the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory near Batavia, was to build a large particle accelerator ring encircling a good part of Kane County.
Residents won this one, too, after the election of George Bush (the father) in 1988, when he decided the SSC would go to Texas. A portion of the large ring was built but ran out of funding and never was finished.

A Kane County landfill, throughout the late 1980s. Kane County Board officials attempted to locate a huge landfill in northwestern Kane County, near Lily Lake. It was to take the place of Settler's Hill in Geneva when it closed. Officials saw the new landfill as bringing in revenue to the county, but residents in the area saw it as eating up a huge chunk of farmland, causing potential health problems and lessening area property values.
Residents won this battle when Kane County backed down in the face of opposition. Eventually, the county shifted gears entirely, saying it would never site another landfill in the county, instead looking to site transfer stations where garbage would be held for a day before being transported to a landfill somewhere else.

The natural gas Guardian pipeline, proposed to run through Kane County by a consortium of three energy companies. Kane County residents won this by default, when Guardian decided to reroute the pipeline through DeKalb County instead.

The E-3 campaign. OK, this is a real trivia question, because it probably is little noted nor long remembered, but western Kane Countians, particularly in St. Charles, Campton, Blackberry, Virgil and Plato townships, organized this in the late 1980s to fight what they feared would be a raft of small-lot subdivisions in the western townships.
Saying those were out of character with the already larger lots and bigger houses in the area, they fought for Kane County to plan for similar houses in the future. The E-3 stood for an estate lot zoning classification on Kane County's land-use plan at the time.

There also are some battles in parts of western Kane that are ongoing with the outerbelt battle. Some Blackberry Township and Elburn residents have protested plans for the new Metra commuter-rail station in Elburn, although that has lost steam because plans for the station are so far along.

And residents near LaFox are fighting the proposed Grand Prairie subdivision next to the settlement of LaFox. That subdivision plan is undergoing staff review in preparation for a Planning Commission hearing.

Anyone driving down LaFox Road these days between Route 38 and Keslinger Road can see plenty of anti-Grand Prairie signs.