Who wouldn’t welcome 4,000 well-paid jobs to an 88-acre corporate campus that’s sat empty for more than two years?
Dozens in Lisle, Ill., don’t as Navistar International Corp. takes steps to move its headquarters and engineering operations to a site vacated by Alcatel-Lucent S.A.
Navistar says its use for the site in the western suburbs of Chicago would fit under the same zoning designation as that for Alcatel-Lucent. But residents of an upscale neighborhood less than a football field away from the property say designing telephones is a lot different from designing trucks.
Navistar’s possible move to Lisle could have major implications for the Fort Wayne economy. At a public hearing late last month, an architect for Navistar said it’s critical for the company to move its engineering and administrative functions to the same place. That would mean the loss of about 1,000 jobs at Navistar’s Truck Design and Technology Center and some of its three other Fort Wayne locations.
Navistar won’t comment publicly on its plans, other than to say the consolidation in Lisle is a possibility it’s considering. But those considerations are well along.
At last month’s meeting of the Lisle Planning and Zoning Commission, architect Tom Rowland testified that Navistar has had 16 architects on its payroll for months planning to rework the Alcatel-Lucent property in a way that would enable Navistar to move its headquarters about five miles from Warrenville, Ill., and consolidate it with engineering operations now in Fort Wayne and Melrose Park, Ill.
In August, Navistar got Lisle, DuPage County and the state of Illinois to agree to cede part of a forest preserve to enhance Navistar’s access to the Alcatel-Lucent property.
And on Oct. 16, the Illinois House of Representatives unanimously passed a bill that opponents say would grant Navistar $40 million in tax benefits if it makes the move to Lisle. With such a margin in the House, there’s little chance the measure won’t pass the Illinois Senate, observers say.
But however badly Navistar wants to make Lisle home to its world headquarters, it can’t do so unless the village approves a special-use permit and a planned-use development for the site. And dozens of Lisle residents don’t want that to happen.
“I don’t want it in my backyard, of course,” Tom Stefeley said. “It’s good for the community overall, but it would be terrible for me.”
Stefeley lives on Pebble Creek Drive, a neighborhood he described as having homes starting about $750,000. Stefeley’s and his neighbors’ backyards are less than 100 yards from the northeast boundary of Navistar’s proposed development.
And it’s the building Navistar’s proposing for that section of the property that has residents most worried. The company proposes to demolish existing structures there and put up a 380,000- square-foot advanced-technology center. That’s where engineers now in Fort Wayne and Melrose Park, Ill., would design and test engines and trucks.
At a hearing last month, Lisle planning and zoning officials said the general use Navistar wants to put the property to – research and office – is no different from that of Alcatel-Lucent, a telephone company.
Some residents disagreed.
“You can distinguish between research and development of telephones and research and development of trucks,” said Cynthia Moderi, who lives on Pebble Creek Drive.
Residents are concerned about the noise. Navistar says it will do its testing indoors and will conduct at most 30 outside truck movements a day. It says the “vast majority” will be between 6 a.m. and 8 p.m., but there will be exceptions.
Residents also are concerned about safety. More than 150,000 gallons of fuel and other fluids would be stored in 15 above-ground tanks next to the Advanced Technology Center.
“It’s heavy industry, not the intent of this property,” Stefeley said.
Russell Whitaker, an attorney representing Navistar before the zoning board, declined to comment for this story. But he told the board last month that fuel storage was nothing new for the site – Alcatel-Lucent had underground tanks.
Stefeley said he’s concerned about safety, noise and traffic. But mostly he’s concerned about the 40-foot height of the advanced technology center. Navistar plans an acoustic fence and landscaping around the center, but Stefeley says that will obscure less than half the building.
“This building is bigger than an IKEA building,” Stefeley said. “This will take up my entire view. It will make my property value drop like a rock.”
In announcing the bill granting tax breaks for Navistar’s proposed move, state Rep. Michael Connelley, R-Lisle, crowed that it would bring more than 800 jobs from out of state.
He didn’t respond to a request for an interview, but he was quoted in one media account saying the bill was an economic “shot across the bow” at Indiana.
Against so much political momentum, Stefeley is doubtful that residents in the roughly 100 homes near the Alcatel-Lucent site can do much to stop Navistar’s plans.
“There’s not much of an emotional uproar except up here,” he said.
