June 29, 2024
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New Joliet warehouse planned near Louis Joliet Mall

Development planned along Division Street behind Target store

By Bob Okon
Traffic. moves through the intersection of Division Street and Hennepin Drive in Joliet, an area where a developer wants to build one or more warehouses. June 24, 2024

Traffic. moves through the intersection of Division Street and Hennepin Drive in Joliet, an area where a developer wants to build one or more warehouses. June 24, 2024 (Bob Okon)

More warehouse plans for the city will be considered Wednesday by a Joliet City Council committee.

The council’s Land Use and Economic Development Committee will review one plan to build warehouses in the vicinity of Louis Joliet Mall on the West Side of Joliet and another that would expand the Cherry Hill Industrial Park on the East Side.

Both plans are on the agenda for the committee when it meets at 9 a.m. Wednesday at City Hall.

MWI Property Group wants to build one or two warehouses on 31 acres located roughly at Division Street and Hennepin Drive. The land is located behind the Target store on Plainfield Road and on the other side of Division Street.

The developer is asking the city to rezone the property from a general business zoning to a light industrial zoning, which carries less restrictions on what can be built.

The plan is to build a 338,000-square-foot warehouse or two warehouses that would be 231,000 square feet and 153,000 square feet in size.

The city’s general business zoning, now assigned to the parcel, allows warehouses but “would require a more commercial look than just a pre-cast concrete building,” Joliet City Planning Director James Torri said.

A semitrailer on Division Street, already a heavily used truck route, passes a site where a developer wants to build additional warehouses in Joliet.

A semitrailer on Division Street, already a heavily used truck route, passes a site where a developer wants to build additional warehouses in Joliet. (Bob Okon)

The general business zoning is the same zoning that was applied to the Joliet Commons shopping center, which includes the Target store located north of the Division Street site.

General business zoning allows for retail, restaurants and office space as well as warehouses.

The light industrial zoning sought by MWI Property Group would lower the construction standards for the site.

The Land Use and Economic Development Committee also will consider a plan from Northern Builders to expand the warehouse development it has done in the Cherry Hill Business Park.

Northern Builders wants to develop 47 acres adjacent to the Cherry Hill Business Park for an 802,440 square-foot warehouse and future industrial development.

Both plans are going to the council committee for review under a new process in which potentially controversial projects first are considered by the committee before going to the city’s Zoning Board of Appeals or Plan Commission for a vote of recommendation.

The full City Council ultimately will decide on the plans.

Warehouse projects in the city have faced increased scrutiny because of the number of semitrailers they generate for local roads.