Carpentersville officials looking for ways to head off traffic woes accompanying new Randall Road businesses

With a new Starbucks coming soon and a third Woodman’s gas station under construction, Randall Road in Carpentersville is booming.

But with it comes the toll of success — growing traffic numbers that village officials are trying to alleviate.

“Right now, it’s a nightmare,” Carpentersville resident Wendy Aguilar said.

Aguilar broached the subject with the Carpentersville Village Board at its meeting last week, suggesting the traffic woes would only get worse once the new businesses open.

The Starbucks is part of a development that’s packaged with the Brunch Café and a Menards home improvement store, located west of Randall Road, north of Miller Road and south of Huntley Road. The property has two entrances and exits on to Miller Road, where it creates the traffic problems, she said.

Woodman’s Food Market is south of Miller Road. With two busy gas stations there and a third under construction, the Woodman’s parcel has just four entrances.

Aguilar wanted to know “what is under review and if you have any timeline on when that would be completed,” she said.

Carpentersville is considering creating access onto Huntley Road, but “we are looking at what the best outcome would be,” said Ajay Jain, of HR Green, the village’s engineering firm.

The village is doing due diligence because it doesn’t want to make matters worse, he said.

“We, as the village, should have been looking into this for a while before we started giving permits (to those projects),” Village Manager John O’Sullivan conceded. “We, as a village staff, not excluding myself, could have collectively done a better job.”

O’Sullivan said he thinks what happened was the village’s business, planning, and zoning commissions didn’t want “to impede the growth of business. I get we want to promote business, but a little more forethought would be helpful here.”

Carpentersville officials have been looking at solutions to the traffic issues in the five months since O’Sullivan was hired, he said.

One thing the village has done is modify the traffic pattern out of the Starbucks, moving the exit so traffic goes onto a driveway apron leading into Menards that then takes drivers to Miller Road.

Additionally, village officials have had initial talks with a church on Huntley Road to either purchase a piece of land or obtain an easement for right in/right out access onto Huntley Road, creating a third entrance into Menards.

“I can’t say too much, but they did not object, and they did call us,” O’Sullivan said.

HR Green is to present a plan next week to the Kane County Division of Transportation, which is in charge of approving a Huntley Road access point, he said. If that entitu approves the idea, Carpentersville can reapproach the church about the property, he said.

“I wish I could wave a magic wand, but it will be a few months yet,” O’Sullivan said, adding, “we are moving with all deliberate speed.”

Gloria Casas is a freelance reporter for The Courier-News.