New Industrial Warehouse Facility For Joliet? Planning, Zoning Reviews Project Later Today At City Hall

JOLIET, IL — The city of Joliet's zoning board and planning commission will hold meetings on Thursday afternoon at 2 and 4 p.m. respectively to review annexation plans for another major industrial warehouse, this one planned on South Houbolt Road, on the other side of the Houbolt Road Toll Bridge that leads to the CenterPoint intermodal.

According to city documents, LPC Acquisition Company, LLC is the contract purchaser from the Stepan Company and the address for the proposed warehouse will be 23960 S. Houbolt Road. It's part of City Council District 5 of Suzanna Ibarra.

The 74-acre subject property is located within unincorporated Will County. The petitioner has submitted a corresponding petition to annex the subject property to the City of Joliet with a requested zoning classification of light industrial.

The property has been used for agricultural purposes for its history and contains farmland and several agricultural buildings. The northeast corner of the site contains a tributary of Cedar Creek within the 100-year floodplain. There is also a 50-foot pipeline easement across the north of the parcel.

The site is at the northwest corner of Houbolt Road and Millsdale Road. In 2022, Houbolt Road north of the site was reconstructed into a four-lane road when the Houbolt Road Bridge was completed over the Des Plaines River to provide a connection between Interstate 80 and CenterPoint Intermodal Center. Millsdale Road south of the site is a private road that was vacated in 2010 at the time of annexation and development of the industrial site to the south.

City documents show that a series of variations are needed from Joliet to allow construction of a new industrial warehouse facility. The Zoning Board of Appeals makes the final decision on these Variation requests.

"The petitioner is requesting the following Variations from the off-street parking regulations and the landscaping regulations to allow the construction of a new industrial warehouse facility in the I-1, light industrial, zoning district at 23960 S. Houbolt Road:

• Variation to exceed the maximum number of parking spaces for semi-trailers and tractor-trailer combinations

• Variation to allow parking for semi-trailers to be located along and across from the shorter side of the building

• Variation to allow parking for semi-trailers within 50 feet of a building corner

• Variation to waive the requirement for parkway trees

The zoning and land use for the adjacent properties are as follows:

• North: County A-1 (agricultural), pipeline parcel

• South: City I-2 (general industrial), industrial warehouse

• East: City I-TC (intermodal terminal – industrial park), industrial warehouse and distribution center; fueling center

• West: County A-1 (agricultural), farmland / open space