Village Hoping to Alleviate Congestion at 99th & Pulaski

Have you ever sat on 99th Street in front of and tried to turn left? It's a daunting task that residents and visitors attempt every day with apprehension, according to the Village Board.

Trustees approved a resolution allowing the village to apply for a grant that would help make turning southbound and northbound from 99th Street and Pulaski Road much easier.

The village board an application for the Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality Improvement Program, made available through the Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning (CMAP).

"We are requesting this grant to straighten out some of the problems that 99th and Pulaski, some on the Evergreen side and some on the Oak Lawn side," said Mayor James Sexton in Monday's Village Board Meeting.

The grant will allow the village to add turn lanes and arrow signals to the east-west directions of the 99th Street and Pulaski Road intersection. There are currently two lanes at the intersection, with arrows going north and south.

Going westbound, crews would create a left turn lane going southbound, that Sexton hopes would stop the traffic from backing up. On the Oak Lawn side, crews would make a northbound left turn lane to stop cars from backing up.

"We've been looking for things to throw at this grant and we found something,” said Sexton. "It alleviates congestion and improves air quality…everybody sits there and the exhaust just runs and runs."

The village board said the project would cost $430, 000, but the grant would cover 80 percent.  Since the new lanes and signals would equally benefit the Oak Lawn side of the intersection, Sexton said, "We would work with Oak Lawn to pay the other 20 percent."

The area, Sexton said, gets very busy around school hours and when people are going home from work.

He said, if the village supports the grant application adding the new lanes and signals "you won't have to sneak out and find out if there's somebody coming the other way."

According to Sexton, the grant application is due by April 1 to CMAP. Village Engineer Tim said because the village board has already backed the grant application by 20 percent, "It helps us in the grant review process, because that means you're diligent to the money and you've already before we even get any grant money from them…backing us 20 percent, which puts you a leg in front of some of the other (communities) because they don't already have that."