Should We Own the Metra Station?

A recent email from the mayor included a few bullet-pointed “issues” about Jim Dodge.

“He lost $47 million of taxpayer money on the Downtown Triangle.”

We are all still waiting to see that evidence. We are a month away from the election and all we have is the accusation. I’m forced to set that accusation aside because I’m unable to find any story (from a legitimate news source) that details the math or points to Jim Dodge, directly.

“He gave away $64 million in taxpayer funds to a developer who only invested $1 million.”

Again, this is a vague reference to a phantom developer over an unnamed project. If it’s true, name the developer. Name the project. And please, tell us how a trustee could single-handedly dole out money to anyone.

At this stage of the election cycle, there has to be more meat to an accusation like that.

At first, I thought it could’ve been a reference to the village’s first TIF at Park Place (Dick’s, Kohl’s, etc.) back in 1998. But that was only a $32 million investment by HSA Inc. and a $4.2 million TIF revenue note.

The debt was retired early and everyone considered that to be a profound win. Plus, Dodge was key to negotiating that TIF with the school districts.

I have to let go of the $64 million question.

On to more of the campaign email:

“He (Dodge) spent 20 years playing real estate mogul with your money – and we ended up with a Metra station we don’t own, roads to nowhere, and a retention pond nobody asked for.”

I assume that all of this refers specifically to the Triangle.

Roads to nowhere is a little harsh. We needed an ingress/egress in and out of the Triangle. As for the retention pond nobody asked for…

The whole Triangle Project was patterned after Cosmopolitan on the Canal in downtown Indianapolis. Karie Friling, who was the Director of Development at the time, liked the what she saw.

That was back in 2010.

Retention ponds are permanent water features unlike detention ponds that are temporary for stormwater runoff as “wet basins”. Don’t forget, aside from the apartments in the Triangle there is a lot of striped blacktop and concrete for the Metra station. All of that melting snow, ice, and rainwater needs to go somewhere other than our basements.

On one hand, he’s complaining that Dodge somehow forced the village to buy real estate, then in the same email he’s complaining that we don’t own the Metra station.

Let’s look at that.

Are all Metra stations owned by communities?

Mostly, no.

Tinley Park owns theirs, as does Elmhurst and LaGrange.

Are there advantages to owning a commuter station?

Some.

However, community ownership of a commuter rail station brings with it responsibility and expenses.

Currently, Metra police are responsible for safety concerns. Metra pays for maintenance, upkeep, upgrades, renovations, ADA compliance, landscaping, snow removal, salting the platform, etc.

Is it in the village’s best interest to do all of that?

I don’t think so.

Our station cost $10 million to build. Metra spent that. Not us.

If it were our station, we’d need to make certain that it was staffed for operations and janitorial services.

What about the money we’d be able to collect from station parking?

Back during Covid, when parking revenues collapsed because everyone was working from home…we would’ve eaten those losses.

Metra lost hundreds of millions during the pandemic.

Of course, no one could’ve predicted a pandemic…but you can never plan for everything.

Owning the station would’ve opened us up for more legal liability for slip-and-falls, accidents, and infrastructure failures.

If there were service reductions, cuts, schedule changes, we’d have nothing to say about any of them. Upkeep is still needed whether the station is packed or empty.

Believe me, we miss Lang Lee’s (who used to be in Orland Plaza) as much as anybody else. But my wife and I would rather have a $10 million commuter station that wasn’t a constant liability and a money pit.

Finally, supposedly under Dodge’s watch (which was never his singular watch):

“40% of our roads were in poor condition.”

Illinois has a PCI (Pavement Condition Index) that was developed by United States Army Corps of Engineers. The index goes from 0 to 100. Zero means failed pavement. I’ve never seen a PCI report on collectors and feeders for any specific community. I think this index is reserved for highways.

While some of the older streets are a bit rough as a result of wear and tear, I’m yet to drive over any devil’s washboard streets in the village.

Any administration, the current one as well, pick and choose what streets get done. We probably have around 500 miles of streets. Costs per mile can be as low as $5,000 and as high as $105,000 with averages hovering around $50,000.

We shouldn’t stress about decisions that were made 25 and 30 years ago by long forgotten boards.

For us, the future starts on April 1.