Restaurant Row brings thousands of visitors to Wheeling each year, but village officials believe there can be more of a draw along Milwaukee Avenue than good food.

Behind popular dining spots such as Le Francais and Bob Chinn’s Crabhouse winds the Des Plaines River, a natural asset that some say Wheeling has ignored for too long.

Another spot that falls in the same “neglected” category is Maury Berman’s property near Mors Avenue on Milwaukee. A black boarded-up building sits on the lot where Berman has been planning for 18 years to open his second “Superdawg Drive-in” restaurant.

Two projects talked about for years, opening the hot dog restaurant and building a walkway on the east bank of the river, finally may be moving forward.

The village is waiting for the go-ahead from the Cook County Forest Preserve District to fully design its riverwalk. The land on either side of the river is owned by the county forest preserve, which has to approve any construction on it. Village officials received a favorable response to their riverwalk idea when they met with a forest preserve superintendent last spring.

Village President Greg Klatecki and village staff have come up with a few design ideas since then.

Economic Development Director Bill Whitmer said the village took ideas from other existing riverwalks and submitted a concept plan last month to the Forest Preserve District. The village now is waiting for feedback.

“Before we go any further, we want to graphically understand their point of view,” Whitmer said.

Klatecki said the value of a riverwalk to a community is evident in Naperville. On a recent weekend night, Klatecki visited the western suburb along the DuPage River.

“The whole town was alive with people walking along the river,” he said.

Naperville has a 3.5-mile brick walkway along the portion of the river that winds through the city’s downtown area and is raising money to extend it another half mile.

Backers of a Wheeling riverwalk are proposing a more modest project measured in blocks as opposed to miles. Community Development Director Bill Whitmer said the walk would run roughly from Dundee Road south to Manchester Drive.

The riverwalk would provide outdoor recreation for local residents and could complement a dinner out at one of the popular restaurants along Milwaukee Avenue. On a busy weekend night, diners waiting for a table could pass the time strolling along the river.

Development funds for the village’s tax-increment-financing district could be used to pay for the path, total costs for which are unknown at this point.

Resident Gary Cohn, who is a strong supporter of the project, is investigating other grants that might be available to help pay for the walk.

The riverwalk is intended to capture the attention of not only Wheeling residents, but people from the surrounding northwest suburbs as well, Whitmer said.

“To get the full use of it, we need to offer people a place to park,” he said.

For that reason, the village is looking into acquiring vacant and unused property on the east side of Milwaukee.

And that is where the Berman property figures into the equation. Strategically located along the proposed riverwalk, it offers one possible parking solution. When the village trustees directed the village staff in August to begin the process to acquire Berman’s lot, Berman told village officials “to get their hands off.” After paying interest and taxes on the property for 18 years, Berman said, he wasn’t about to lose it.

Berman said he held off expanding his family-owned business all these years until he could obtain the capital he needed. He also recently renovated his drive-in restaurant on Milwaukee and Devon avenues in Chicago.

“We didn’t want to plunge in and have a skeleton structure,” he said of the Wheeling location.

Berman is now in the process of negotiating financing for the Wheeling restaurant through a Lincolnshire bank. The loan, combined with “a considerable amount” of TIF money the village would have to grant, would give him the approximate $2.5 million he said he will need to open a new restaurant on Milwaukee.

Once he has the necessary funding, Berman said within 60 days he will present updated plans to the village for a restaurant with seating for 100 customers inside, a picnic area outdoors and the “car-hop” service familiar to customers at his Chicago location. He also may request village approval to operate a drive-through window at his new Superdawg.

And he is open to the idea of sharing parking behind his restaurant with visitors to a riverwalk.

“We would welcome it,” he said. “It would be a place for gathering and recreation.”

Berman’s property also is important for another reason. The strip of forest preserve property in the area being considered for the path is widest behind his property. Berman said his property line is 150 feet west of the riverbank, which would allow room for the footings of a pedestrian and bicycle bridge to span the river.

This would help the village satisfy one of the forest preserve’s priorities. After the meeting last spring, Joseph Nevius, general superintendent of the district, said he wanted Wheeling’s riverwalk to connect with the existing network of trails in Lake and Cook counties. A bridge over the Des Plaines behind Restaurant Row could link the riverwalk to the forest preserve’s trail on the east bank of the river.

Forest preserve officials suggested an asphalt path in their discussions with the village because the river path would lie in a floodway. Whitmer expects winter thaws or heavy rains will put the path underwater at certain times of the year.

Cohn is not willing to concede this point. He is hoping the forest preserve district will agree to a wooden, deck-like walk that would be raised above the river level. Such structures have worked in other low-lying areas, he said, and the fact that the forest preserve district won’t have to pay for it should make the idea more appealing.

The key, though, is to get the necessary approval and move forward.

“I just don’t want this to take 10 years,” Cohn said.

Wheeling.com winner of the Chamber of Commerce
"Business of the year" award!
Home | Back | Guestbook | Retail Property | Businesses | Events
Election 97 | Chamber of Commerce | Neighborhoods | Wheeling Links
Local News | Cool Links and Free Stuff | Comments | Volunteers

---

This site created and maintained by: Byte Me! Computer Sales and Service, Inc.