Western Springs And Hinsdale End Rift On Bridge

WESTERN SPRINGS, IL — Western Springs and Hinsdale appeared to have found agreement on the style of the new pedestrian bridge over Interstate 294.

This week, the Western Springs Village Board received more detailed numbers on the village's cost of maintenance for the bridge, which would be next to 47th Street.

Western Springs was told a couple of months ago that its costs would amount up to $250,000 in 25 years to repaint the entire bridge with a painted finish, plus $60,000 for picket-style fencing.

But Illinois Tollway official Nicole Nutter told the Western Springs Village Board on Monday that both villages had agreed to go with a weatherized steel for the bridge structure, which requires no maintenance costs for the villages.

She said the costs amounted to $65,000 to $80,000 for the repainting of the picket-style fencing in about 25 years. With the much lower amount, the trustees approved that option over its previous choice of chain-link fencing, which Hinsdale officials opposed.

At a meeting last week, the Hinsdale Village Board stuck to picket-style fencing and wondered why Western Springs wanted chain-link fencing.

Nutter told Hinsdale trustees that Western Springs officials hadn't been given all the cost information.

At Monday's meeting, Western Springs Village President Alice Gallagher asked trustees for their views. All of them favored the picket-style fencing, with the new information indicating that maintaining chain link would actually have been costlier.

"I picked chain link before because I expected it to be quite a bit less expensive," Trustee James John said.

Added Gallagher, "We were trying not to incur additional costs for future boards."

The pedestrian bridge between Hinsdale and Western Springs is being replaced as part of the I-294 construction project. Late last year, the villages requested the new bridge go along 47th Street, about a half mile south of the current site. It will be considerably wider than the existing structure, officials said.