McHenry Times

At their March 23rd board meeting, the village officials from Huntley received a presentation on a final plat of consolidation and site plan review for Huntley Ford vehicle dealership located at 13900 Automall Drive. The business is looking to build a new vehicle display lot, which might include some zoning reliefs. This topic was first brought to the board back in July of 2022, and although the project has changed some since then, it is still fairly similar to the concept presented then, and the council voted to approve the requests.

The dealership wants to consolidate their current property, lot 1, which is 5 acres, with the new proposed addition, lot 2, which is about 4 acres. The new 9.01-acre lot will have 526 feet of frontage on Automall Drive as the secondary lot is on the side of the current parking lot. They are requesting reliefs from the village as these new numbers will not meet zoning requirements that would have them hold a 15+ acre lot and at least 600 feet of frontage. They have already been granted relief as their current property and frontage are even smaller than the proposed addition. They will be adding a new sign along Route 47.

Planning Commission reviewed the request on February 13th. They did recommend approval by a vote of 5 to 0, subject to eight conditions.

“These are typical conditions of approval, for the most part, with exception to four conditions, which I'll call out you see condition three which requires parking areas for an hour for the display vehicle sales only: vehicle display lot shall not be used for any other type of outside storage or automobile repair activities,” Charles Nordman, Director of Development Services of Huntley. On number four, parking spaces shall not be leased to an off-premises business. Condition five: All parking and display shall be taking place on paved surfaces, and then the planning commission added condition number eight that no on-street parking or display is permitted.”

The new vehicle display lot will have 350 new parking spaces for display vehicles, and all vehicles will be set back 25 feet from the west property line and at least 85 feet away from the side of Route 47. The entire lot will be surrounded by a metal fence with a rolling access door in the new lot, although this fence also requires a relief from the village for it. There will be cross access between the old parking lot and the new, and the dealership has accommodated all the improvements and the new lot with their stormwater management system on the north. They are adding plenty of landscaping and islands to the lot, with 44 shade trees, 9 evergreen trees, and 9 ornamental trees, along with shrubs and flowers.