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Niles Mayor Previews ‘State Of Village’ Address


Niles Mayor Andrew Przybylo at the recent Coming Together press conference at the Niles-Maine District Library.

The Niles Chamber of Commerce will host its annual Leadership Luncheon from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. tomorrow (Thursday) at Lone Tree Manor, 7730 N. Milwaukee Ave. Niles Mayor Andrew Przybylo will deliver his annual State of the Village address as keynote speaker.

The event also serves as the chamber’s annual meeting where board members and top officers take their annual oaths of office.

The Journal spoke with Przybylo Monday (Jan. 21) about what he would discuss in his address, looking at what took place in 2018 and what he expects to see in the coming year.

Przybylo said he would look back at one of the village’s largest public works projects ever completed: the installation of new fresh water transmission mains from Evanston to Niles and Morton Grove as the village moves from purchasing water from Chicago to Evanston.

Other large village projects and initiatives in 2019 and beyond Przybylo said he would discuss include the Golf Mill Park project; plans for the village’s five tax increment financing districts, four of which were only created in the last few months; flood detention projects; the coming Milwaukee Avenue Pace Pulse bus rapid transit service; plans to create a new public space between the police station and community rain garden on Touhy Avenue west of Milwaukee; a possible new Metra Station near Touhy and Lehigh avenues; arts and culture plans; and village finance, pension and technology issues.

The project at Golf Mill Park is also one of the largest in the village’s history as it will add massive flood detention vaults under an adjacent village-owned property to the park at 9101 Greenwood Ave. It will double the size of Golf Mill Park itself and add arts pavilions.

Przybylo said he would discuss other stormwater detention planned along Milwaukee Avenue along with another area to showcase arts and culture near the south end of Milwaukee near the rain garden.

Przybylo said there are plans to build a Metra station near one of the TIFs roughly bounded by Gross Point Road, Touhy and Lehigh avenues. Anchored by the Niles Leaning Tower, it’s called the Gross Point Touhy TIF, or the Touhy Triangle, at Lehigh and Jarvis avenues.

Przybylo said he hopes to move the project forward in 2019, but said it could be 2020 before the Regional Transportation Authority and Metra boards give their OK.

The village is also looking forward to seeing a new Pace Pulse bus rapid transit service — in the works for years — launch in 2019. Przybylo said the service would be an economic driver for transit-oriented development along the route running from the Jefferson Park Transit Terminal to the Golf Mill Shopping Center.

In terms of a shifting business climate, with the rise of online retail from services like Amazon.com, Przybylo said the village would have to be smarter about retail development, moving away from big box retailers to smaller boutique retailers along Milwaukee Avenue in first floors below residential units. He said transit-oriented development would feed this kind of development.

Przybylo said Amazon’s recent purchase of Whole Foods shows even online retailers still need a physical presence.

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