Elgin looks at next phase of bike path
By Mike Danahey mdanahey@stmedianetwork.com September 14, 2012 5:10PM
Ron Rudd of West Dundee and city councilman John Steffen ride along Douglas Avenue in Elgin Thursday with a pack of cyclists promoting bike to work week. June 14, 2012 | Michael Smart~Sun-Times Media
Updated: October 17, 2012 6:37AM
ELGIN — A lengthy project to build a bike route on the east side of the city will move on to a second phase.
The city council has approved an agreement between Elgin and the Illinois Department of Transportation to pay for an engineering services agreement with TranSystems Corp. for the second of four phases of a long-in-the-works bike route on Elgin’s northeast side.
The agreement is a reimbursement grant where the city fronts the $85,000 cost of this part of the project and is reimbursed $68,000 (80 percent) upon providing proof of payment to IDOT.
Federal funding is covering 80 percent of the entire cost of more than $610,000 for the 2.7-mile project. The city began working on the path extension in 2008 and won’t be finished with it until sometime in 2014.
The new route will go along Douglas Avenue, Slade Avenue, Prospect Boulevard and Congdon Avenue. A side path exists on the north side of Congdon Avenue between Indian Drive and Maureen Drive at Elgin city limits. At the city limits, the trail continues eastward, providing access to the Shoe Factory Road Woods and the Poplar Creek Preserve in the village of Hoffman Estates.
Eventually, this work will connect the downtown bicycle network at Douglas Avenue and Kimball Street on the west to an existing trail on Congdon Avenue in Cook County on the east.
“The city anticipates that the Phase II work would not start until February 2013 and completed in five months for an August 2013 bid letting,” Elgin Management Analyst Aaron Cosentino said. “That would allow construction to begin in October 2013 and to be completed in early or mid-2014.”
