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Yorkville looks to acquire part of Blackberry Oaks Golf Course for Kennedy Road expansion · Kendall County News - Shaw Local

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  Speaker 1: Yorkville looks to acquire part of BlackBerry Oaks golf Course
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  for Kennedy Road expansion. Written by Joey Weslow. This article
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  is being read by an automated voice brought to you
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  by Everlett. After trying for almost two years to purchase
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  part of BlackBerry Oaks golf Course for expanding Kennedy Road,
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  the City of Yorkville is reaching for another club in
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  its bag eminent domain. The impasse between the city and
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  club centers on zero point eighty four acres of perspective
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  right of way and zero point one point one acres
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  of temporary easement of the golf course's property. The proposed
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  easement is thirty feet by one two hundred and twenty
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  five feet. The city has offered the golf course eighteen
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  hundred dollars, which the city says is based on an
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  estimated fair market value cost. According to city documents, the
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  city's total project to expand Kennedy Roaw and Freedom Trail
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  intersection was initially estimated to cost around one million dollars.
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  The project includes widening the pavement and adding turn lanes
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  to improve the safety of the intersection. The city argues
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  the near two years of failed negotiations with the golf
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  course has resulted in added costs of seventy five thousand
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  dollars to one hundred thousand dollars because of pushback, construction dates,
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  and inflationary costs as a result of the ongoing project delay,
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  status of fixed funding for the project, and need to
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  improve the capacity and profile of the roadway to improve safety,
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  Staff is requesting authorization to proceed to eminent domain on
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  a total of zero point nine to five acres parcel
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  if necessary, Staff said in city documents. The city said
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  in addition to the money, it has offered accommodations for
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  tree replacement and free water service to the property. According
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  to city documents, staff is undergoing one more final round
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  of negotiations with the golf course for a voluntary acquisition
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  before proceeding if the request for eminent domain is approved
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  by City Council during its January twenty seventh meeting. In
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  twenty twenty one, the city received around two point eight
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  million dollars from the developers of the Grande Reserve subdivision
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  for reconstructing Kennedy Road due to the influx of new
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  traffic from residents moving to the area in the wake
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  of the initial failed negotiations with the golf course, the
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  city looked at potentially shifting the roadway east towards the
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  Grande Reserve subdivision and away from BlackBerry Oaks. The city
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  deemed that option less desirable because it would come into
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  contact with many private and city utilities that would need
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  to be moved. This would add costs and delay the
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  project another one to two years, adding even more inflationary costs.
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  Even shifting the roadway east would require a chunk of
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  the golf course's property. For the ordinance to pass, it
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  requires a majority approval from city council.