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Aurora Beacon-News
May 16, 2002
Consensus building: Researchers want map for regional planning
By Dave Parro
STAFF WRITER
YORKVILLE ó It was kind of tough to get the point across Tuesday night, but the 15 people who came to the Northern
Illinois University meeting on the Prairie Parkway seemed to eventually understand: Researchers conducting the
NIU study won't have any input on the specifics of the proposed outer-belt highway.
Instead, two different committees will outline a process by which regional consensus should be built, if and
when the road through Kane and Kendall counties is constructed.
John Lewis, economist and associate director for NIU's Center for Governmental Studies, said the study will develop
a framework for regional planning that could be used for any transportation corridor nationwide.
"It's our feeling that the land-use around the corridor needs to be managed in a way that meets economic
needs while ensuring a high quality of life," Lewis said at the Beecher Center in Yorkville, where the third
of three NIU informational meetings was held.
Similar meetings were held in Morris and Sugar Grove in the past 10 days.
A few landowners and highway opponents at the meeting criticized the study because it assumes construction of
the road. They also blasted plans for the highway itself, though the NIU study does not look at why or where the
outer belt should be built.
Lewis explained that the end product of the study will be a report to the Illinois Department of Transportation,
detailing how the state should approach the road project in order to best serve the region and include all opinions.
It will not address how this particular road should be built.
A study committee of 12 experts and an advisory committee of 20 to 25 people will start meeting alternately every
six weeks to discuss issues, and the ideas will bounce back and forth between the two.
The expert committee includes researchers with diverse academic and scientific backgrounds, Lewis said. The advisory
committee, which has not yet been formed, will consist of stakeholders who will be affected by the Prairie Parkway,
including politicians, environmentalists, economists, agriculturists and community groups.
"How do you make those decisions?" said Ksenia Rusensuik, of the Naperville-based Conservation Foundation.
"Because you've got an entire citizenry, and you're (choosing) two dozen people."
Lewis said NIU will approach organizations representing each of the stakeholders in search of committee members.
The ultimate goal is to build consensus among groups with differing opinions on how the project should be approached,
he said.
"The intent is not to bring people to the advisory table who are of the same mind," Lewis said.
A public draft of the report will be brought to public hearings in March 2003, and a final report to IDOT is
scheduled to be completed in June of next year.