TEAM'S VISION: NATURE AND PROGRESS UNITED
HOMER TOWNSHIP RESIDENTS WANT PLANNED RETAIL SHOPPING CENTER TO MAINTAIN LAND'S NATURAL BEAUTY.
HOMER TOWNSHIP -- A multistory hotel and conference center is part of the vision for a major retail shopping center planned near 159th Street and the Interstate 355 tollway.
The 40-acre Twin Maples complex would feature 250,000 square feet of hotel, retail, restaurant, entertainment and corporate office space -- all with a goal of keeping the natural wooded beauty of the land, developers say.
(John Patsch/Staff Photographer)
The property is just east of the tollway, northeast of 159th Street and Gougar Road. Currently it is a farm where township resident Cathy Boo's family has lived for 140 years. Cathy and her husband, David Boo, are working with a development team.
The team aims to keep Cathy's vision of development that respects natural resources and preserves the excellent views of the Fiddyment Creek watershed.
"We have a very beautiful site here. It's surrounded on two sides by the Will County Forest Preserve. There's dense, old grove woods and Fiddyment Creek," said Lawrence Locascio, of Champion Realty Advisors LLC in Downers Grove, a partner in the development.
"We think that a hotel-conference center, which might possibly be multistory, would look very nice in the northeast corner, overlooking the woods," said Locascio, an attorney and longtime landowner in Homer Township.
Locascio is working on a team that includes J.D. Salazar, of Champion, and Tim Hague, of Keystone Ventures LLC. Cathy and David Boo, along with this team, announced their plans in April.
"I know there will be some walking trails, some hiking trails through those woods, that the Forest Preserve is going to put in there," Locascio said.
Bruce Hodgdon, spokesman for the Forest Preserve District of Will County, said it is "highly probable" that trails will be built in the long term on these particular preserves.
A hotel and conference center at nearby Twin Maples would have a pleasant, almost resort-like feel, Locascio said.
However, Locascio emphasized that such a hotel, at this point, is only a vision.
At this point, Locascio is seeking a hotel company to sign on.
Locascio mentioned retail projects that could fit into this framework. He said the complex would welcome shops and restaurants, banks, entertainment facilities such as a multiplex movie theater, or a health club or fitness center.
Regarding offices, the complex would welcome corporations seeking to locate their headquarters here. Medical offices also could be part of the picture.
Locascio said the development team is seeking tenants and intends to build the project according to the directives of those tenants. The developers do not intend to do much speculative building, without tenants signed on.