RIVERSIDE-BROOKFIELD Follow us online! rblandmark.com
$1.00
Vol. 37, No. 6
@riversidebrookfieldlandmark @riversidebrookfield_landmark
February 9, 2022
Brookfield village planner fatally struck by Metra train PAGE 3
Also serving North Riverside
@RBLandmark
Downstate judge’s ruling has schools scrambling on masks PAGE 7
Work resumes at Brookfield Ave. bridge site Wells drilled to remove ground water to prep for dam installation, creek excavation By BOB UPHUES Editor
After a layoff of nearly five months due to unforeseen difficulties rerouting a water main, work has resumed at the site of what will be a new Brookfield Avenue bridge over Salt Creek. More exactly, crews are working immediately north of Brookfield Avenue, preparing for the installation, perhaps as early as next week, of an aquadam to expose the Salt Creek riverbed so a trench can be excavated for the new water main. There is a 16-inch water main that runs eastwest under Brookfield Avenue. Because the new bridge will be so much wider than the former one, that water main needs to be rerouted north under the village hall parking lot and then west under the creek before jogging back south to reconnect with the existing Brookfield Avenue main. The village, along with its engineering consultant, Ciorba Engineering, and its general contractor, Lorig Construction, had hoped to bore a hole beneath Salt Creek north of the bridge site for the water main. However, after augers hit solid objects on two attempts late last summer, officials halted work in order to get permission from the Illinois Department of Transportation, which is the lead agency for the project since it involves federal grant funding. See BRIDGE SITE on page 17
COURTESY OF BRIANNA KWASIBORSKI
Lemoni Hernandez and Kayla Krol work on a kindergarten project at Hollywood School in Brookfield in 2019.
D96 appears poised to embrace full-day kindergarten
No school board opposition voiced to committee’s recommendation By BOB SKOLNIK Contributing Reporter
It appears likely that full-day kindergarten will come to Riverside Elemen-
tary School District 96 for the 2022-23 academic year. Although a final decision won’t be made by the school board until its Feb. 16 meeting, a staff committee formed to
investigate the pro and cons of full-day kindergarten delivered a report to the school board at their Feb. 2 committee See D96 on page 17
SUBSCRIBE!
O N LY $ 3 6 fo r 1 3 M o n t h s ! Visit RBLandmark.com • Enter “FREE MONTH”on the “Subscribe “ page for...you guessed it...a FREE month!