Question about St Charles- All thoughts welcome (Chicago, Aurora: hotel, townhouses)

[dreamofmonterey]

Okay- I haven't been there since the 80's but have relatives living there- How is that area now? Also if one works in Chicago how is the commute? The train system seems good; plus a little better if you are used to NYC! Thanks for any help!

sunny.

[Drover]

I grew up in STC and ended up moving back there for 3 years, having just moved out again this August. The population has doubled since the 80s. There is now a second high school, a third middle school and Christ knows how many elementary schools.

It actually has "rush hour" traffic. My afternoon commute from the East side where I worked (right near Pheasant Run) to the West side where I lived (near Randall Road) routinely took 25 minutes.

Speaking of Randall Road, it used to be the dividing line between the suburbs and Iowa, wide-open road that was a quick "back road" way from Elgin to Aurora. No longer. That whole corridor is completely developed with Wal-Marts and Kohl's and Best Buys and Applebee's and and strip malls and everything else. Randall Road is now a snarled mess. What Randall Road used to be -- an open highway that marked the edge of suburban development -- is now what Route 47 is. But not for long -- development is now moving past Route 47. Elburn is booming. Pingree Grove is booming. Gilberts is booming. Hampshire is going absolutely bonkers!

There are almost no cornfields left in STC. It's like the farmers got tired of planting corn, so one day they planted little Monopoly houses instead and boom!, up sprung a bunch of subdivisions. There is now nothing but contiguous housing developments from St. Charles all the way to Wasco.

For all the changes that have gone on around the perimeter, the character of downtown and the surrounding area has changed little. Some stores have come and gone (remember Kaiser's?). The Hotel Baker has been renovated and now serves as an actual hotel again. The Blue Goose is still there. Townhouse Books is still there. Manor Restaurant relocated to Randall Road in South Elgin. There are still antique shops along Main Street, though one of the three Antique Market stores was booted by the landlord to make room for Scotland Yard, which was itself booted from the Arcada building. The Manor was also supposed to re-open in the same building but there was a dispute between the Manor owner and the landlord. Litigation between the two is pending. Speaking of Arcada, it now operates primarily as a live music venue. They still show movies there once in a while, but it's usually part of a bigger event -- for instance, they did a screening of Animal House complete with a toga party and an after-movie concert by Otis Day and the Knights (yes, the actual Otis Day from the movie). All of the scummy bars along Main Street were booted out and cleaner bars were put in their places, but the Main Street corridor is still a Gin Town and it crawls with college-age kids on Friday and Saturday nights. I still haven't figured out where the hell they all come from... are they all STC grads visiting home on the weekends? Do they come all the way in from NIU? I never did figure it out.

As for a commute from STC to Chicago, the only possible way such a commute could be remotely bearable is by taking Metra from either the Geneva or Elgin or LaFox stations (by the way, the Geneva line goes out to Elburn now, with a stop in LaFox along the way), depending on which part of STC you live in. Don't even try doing the commute by car unless you want all your hair to fall out within 8 weeks.

So that's the scoop on STC today.

[dreamofmonterey]

wow- amazing with all the changes (lol- does anyplace NOT have Best Buy or Kohls?) - I remember Elgin -The Fox River (I think) Zoo; yes there were alot of cornfields then- and my unlcle who worked at GM in Chicago joked it was "the sticks"---- what about the horse farms and South 9th Street??-older subdivision- would love if you had any links or pics. We are looking to get near a metro area again (just not too near-lol) Thank you again.

sunny.

[Drover]

Oh, I forgot to mention a couple things. There is a major (and unfortunately dying) mall on the east side, just east of Kirk Road, about half a mile from the high school (what is now St. Charles East High School). It is called Charlestowne Mall and it is comparable in size to the Stratford Square mall. The St. Charles Mall, the one on Prairie Avenue just east of Randall Road, is long gone and was torn down several years ago. The property remains vacant to this day but the parking lots are still there -- it's where I taught my wife and my nephew how to drive a stick shift.

(Ariel photo: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=60174&...15278&t=k&om=1 )

Speaking of Prairie Avenue, it now extends all the way down to and across the river; that is, the city finally built a third automobile bridge across the river. But they substantially hampered its traffic flow on the east end -- it forms a T intersection at Riverside Drive -- so it's practically useless and does very little to relieve congestion on the Illinois and Main Street bridges.

Remember the Piano Factory/Howell Company building on the west end of the pedestrian bridge across the river, just south of downtown? Gone. It sat vacant for a long time through the 70s and 80s. It finally got renovated in the late 80s and turned into an outlet/discount mall. That lasted maybe 5 years. It got torn down and that area is now occupied by very pricey riverfront townhouses. (Nothing beats paying $450,000 for a 2-bedroom townhouse near a river that smells like fish ass.)

Ariel photo of the newish Prairie Street bridge and townhouses where the Howell Company/Piano Factory building used to be:

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=60174&...t=k&iwloc=addr

[Steve-o]

St. Charles now has 35K people almost and growing monthly. The houses start around the Kirk Rd area and now extend about 5 miles west of Randall Rd. Traffic is horrible. It takes me sometimes 40 minutes to get from Pheasant Run to Randall Rd. Geneva is a much better route strangely (Rt. 38). As for a drive to Chicago? The closest highway is Rt.88, and forget about a timely commute downtown. It normally takes me 1.5 to 2 hours to go 30 miles on that road.

Randall Road is now a gigantic mall pretty much from North Aurora to past Crystal Lake. Its all new homes and shopping centers. Its out of control and very ugly. One good thing is that there are some new stores along Randall, north of Red Gate Rd that are quite unique. There is a jazz lounge bar, a gyro joint, a new Village Squier restaurant, a really neat McDonalds ( you ahve to see it to believe it), a bunch of other neat places besides your usual Best Buys and Target's etc.

[OakBrookMom]

I guess you could look at St. Charles as the glass half-full or half-empty. The downtown area is still beautiful. Growing up in West Aurora I thought St. Charles was the most beautiful town along the the Fox River and I still do, although I like Geneva almost as much. My old boss lives out there and commuted and still commutes downtown every day which takes him less than an hour. He was thrilled when they extended the train line closer to where he lived even though his ride time did not decrease. He strategically plans his rides to catch trains that for the most part go straight to/from the city from/to Wheaton so he skips many of the stops. He doesn't drive and neither should you. If you have to drive, unfortunately I would give up the idea of living in STC.
Having family that are halfbackers too(Jersey-Florida-NC&TN) I took them out to Geneva & St. Charles when they came to visit as well as dowtown Chicago. They thought it was beautiful and were shocked at how well the towns preserved their charm and the downtown areas despite all the sprawl. They couldn't believe it when I told them how many people lived out there and showed them Randall Road. I look at these towns and see the best of both worlds. You get everything every other suburbs has and you get the bonus of their beautiful downtowns. I would hate to have seen these downtowns go to pot or get a riverboat and lets face it, the new homes and Randall Road development and even the traffic has helped fund the preservation of these downtowns. As a little girl I dreamed of living on the river and last week I saw a property on the river I begged my husband to look at but he commutes downtown and won't give up his 24 minute train ride. We go out to St. Charles once a month to eat, go to the antique shops, and walk around the downtown. My husband is 1/2 Swedish and we go to Swedish days in the summer in Geneva and partake in the Santa Lucia festivities each year. Compared to the traffic and conjestion in Andersonville, Geneva is great.

[Drover]

Steve-O, have you been to Village Squire? I'm curious about it every time I drive by it but haven't stopped in because I have no idea what it's about. Anyone else?

[jmelts]

Is there still a great flea market there? In the early 80s we got most of our furniture there!

[Steve-o]

Originally Posted by Drover

Steve-O, have you been to Village Squire? I'm curious about it every time I drive by it but haven't stopped in because I have no idea what it's about. Anyone else?

Actually I was just there the other week. Its not bad, nothing to write home about either, its decent at best. Interior decor is similar to the outside, reminiscent of an English castle. Food is decent, I found quite a bit on the menu to be Greek, I had a burger though, which was pretty good. Prices werent horribly bad either, kinda in the Olive Garden range, if that helps explain. Give it a shot and see what you think.

[Drover]

Originally Posted by jmelts

Is there still a great flea market there? In the early 80s we got most of our furniture there!

Yep, still there, and still one of the biggest in the country.