Journal & Topics Media Group

Niles Bicycle Pedestrian Advisory Group’s First Meeting Set Friday

Goal: Improve Safety, Update 2014 Bike Plan


Green squares painted on Cleveland Street at Waukegan Road mark the village’s bike route. (Tom Robb/Journal photo)

The recently formed Niles Bicycle & Pedestrian Plan Advisory Group is scheduled to hold its first meeting Friday, Nov. 13.

The ad hoc committee was recently formed in the wake of continuing pedestrian and bicycle involved accidents to take a fresh look at the village’s 2014 bicycle and pedestrian plan, along with looking at “bicyclist and pedestrian projects, programs, and policies within the village’s road jurisdiction.”

Staff committee liaison Kathy Thake said the meeting would introduce members, discuss the long term goal of advising village trustees on any updates or changes needed to the 2014 plan, along with hearing an update on current projects.

A shrine to the recently departed 13-year-old Sam Yousif near where he was killed in July at Waukegan Road and Cleveland Street. (Tom Robb/Journal photo)

The 2014 plan identified a village bike route and identified several problem intersections. Among those intersections was Cleveland Street and Waukegan Road where Sam Yousif, 13, of Niles, was fatally struck and killed by a pickup truck as he crossed Waukegan the afternoon of Thursday, July 16.

Another member of the committee scheduled to make a presentation on a bicycle and pedestrian safety education campaign is Niles Police Support Services Bureau Chief Nick Zakula.

Giving an update on road and pedestrian safety projects within the village at Friday’s meeting will be Village Engineer Tom Powers. Thake said Powers would give an overview of overall current projects including their statuses and funding sources.

Many of those projects through the years have been complicated by the fact many of Niles’ main thoroughfares, including Milwaukee Avenue, Waukegan Road, Caldwell Avenue, Touhy Avenue, Harlem Avenue, Dempster Street, Oakton Street, and Golf Road, are state routes, where implementing any safety changes includes gaining approval from the state. Those same state routes have been where many major, often fatal, accidents have occurred. 

As an example, a flashing beacon proposed to be installed at Cleveland and Waukegan shortly after the 2014 plan was adopted, but had to be approved by IDOT. In 2016, a fatal pedestrian accident involving a similar beacon in Mount Prospect caused IDOT to instill a moratorium on the installation of any new beacons, which was not lifted until 2019. Currently, there is only a stop sign at that intersection regulating traffic on Cleveland. Similar beacons have also been discussed for the intersection of Cleveland and Caldwell.

View of the Oakton-Caldwell intersection from the forest preserve pedestrian bridge that passes over the busy streets. With students needing to get to nearby Niles West High School, as well as the new Niles Park District facility under construction on Caldwell,. street-level pedestrian improvements are planned. (Journal file photo)

Another ongoing project to install some kind of safe pedestrian crossing along Oakton Street, east of Caldwell, involves IDOT, the Forest Preserve District of Cook County, and the villages of Niles, Morton Grove and Skokie. Morton Grove is the lead agency on the project.

Installing sidewalks along Golf and Milwaukee involves both Pace Suburban Bus and the Regional Transportation Agency.

Village officials have also sought funding for these types of projects through federal Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality program grants administered through the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning, a regional planning agency, which can add additional layers of bureaucracy and project reviews.

Members appointed to the committee include Mayor Andrew Przybylo, as an ex-officio member; Chairman Village Trustee Craig Niedermaier, who also chairs the village’s general government committee; village residents Peggy Reins, Matthew Abtahi, Ticia Doughty-Ashcroft and Stephen Sanders; and, besides Powers, Thake and Zakula, Community Engagement Coordinator Katie Schneider and Village Planner Nathan Bruemmer.

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