Highland Park to put $2 million in state funds toward sidewalk on Sheridan Road despite concerns about tree removal

Highland Park City Council unanimously approved an intergovernmental agreement this month to utilize state funds to build a new sidewalk along an approximately half-mile stretch of Sheridan Road near Rosewood Beach.

City staff first presented the project to the council in 2016, and its long-delayed construction that aims to address safety concerns will now begin in 2026, installing a sidewalk on the east side of Sheridan Road stretching from Roger Williams Avenue to the intersection of Cedar and Dean avenues.

“Safety is a paramount concern and I spoke to multiple residents of Cary Avenue, one of whom said that you took your life into your hands crossing Sheridan Road to get to the beach,” Councilmember Yumi Ross said on Aug. 11 before voting in favor of the agreement. 

While a stretch of Sheridan Road is within Highland Park city limits, the road is owned and maintained in part by the Illinois Department of Transportation. 

As IDOT plans to replace two culverts on Sheridan Road — one near Lakewood Place and another near the entrance to Rosewood Beach — the state will include Highland Park’s sidewalk project in order to minimize disruption to the public from construction, a city memo shows. 

Yet Ross also highlighted concerns from some Highland Park residents about the environmental impact of the construction work, which reportedly requires preemptively cutting down approximately 60 trees along Sheridan Road between October 2025 and April 2026.

The city has held at least five small group meetings with residents about the sidewalk project between July 19, 2016, and June 4, 2025, according to a city memo. 

Danny Kahn, a Highland Park resident who lives on Sheridan Road, said his son wrote a letter to the City Council approximately 25 years ago requesting the city install sidewalks on that stretch of the road as part of a Cub Scouts project. 

But after attending a number of Highland Park’s public meetings on the project, Kahn said he became concerned about the quantity of trees earlier versions of the project may remove, especially given the notable landscape architect Jens Jensen’s work in the area. 

“If you drive on Sheridan Road towards Winnetka or Kenilworth, all the way towards Wilmette, Sheridan Road is typically quite beautiful, there’s gorgeous trees overhanging the road,” Kahn said. 

“Highland Park’s Sheridan Road has always been not as nice as some of these other even wealthier suburbs, but to further degrade it — when this proposal started it was 190 trees were going to be taken out, and we’ve gotten it down by persuading the city to narrow the sidewalk,” Kahn said. 

Addressing the council on Aug. 11, Kahn said he wasn’t opposed to the sidewalk being built but wanted more information from the City to ensure no trees alongside Sheridan Road are removed unnecessarily. 

City Manager Ghida Neukirch said the city has held “countless” meetings with residents about the sidewalk project and would need to pursue a permit from IDOT to pursue variances to the sidewalk designs that could possibly prevent further tree displacement.

Neukirch also said the city is looking at $500,000 worth of Jens Jensen-design landscaping work to be done in the corridor in 2027 — something the state won’t pay for.

For the sidewalk itself, the city is set to utilize approximately $2.3 million in state grant funds to complete the construction — $1.65 million from the Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity and $659,800 from an Illinois Transportation Enhancement program. 

Highland Park will put up $5,750 of its own funds for tree removal as part of a 20% match to the funds provided from the state enhancement program.

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