March 3, 2025 – Village of Arlington Heights Board of Trustees Meeting – beginning at elapsed time 1:06:31 — discussing a resolution that led to the approval of using the services of TYLin Great Lakes to provide for study of vehicular traffic and parking and analytical services that would coincide with a Chicago Bears study for the redevelopment of the Arlington International Racecourse property. YouTube Tips ⓘ
The Chicago Bears sent a letter to the Village of Arlington Heights mid-February 2025 indicating that they have resumed their traffic and economic impact studies, and have begun developing an updated concept plan for the Arlington Park site — the 326-acre property in Arlington Heights owned by the Chicago Bears Football Club, LLC.
The Village of Arlington Heights Board responded Monday night, March 3, 2025 by unanimously approving a resolution authorizing execution of the first amendment to agreement with TYLin Great Lakes, Inc. to provide for vehicular traffic and parking and analytical services that would coincide with a Chicago Bears study for the redevelopment of the Arlington International Racecourse property. The Village of Arlington Heights will be reimbursed for the cost of the studies by the Chicago Bears Football Club. Trustee Jim Tinaglia emphasized that this reimbursement results in a source of money that will prevent the need for money to come from taxpayers.
The resolution approving the services of TYLin Great Lakes Inc. provides an independent study to comprehend and discover issues and suggestions for comparison to the Chicago Bears study related to development of an NFL stadium and new sports and entertainment district in Arlington Heights.
TYLin COMPANY NEWS
Along with TYLin’s extant Land Development and Mobility Systems offerings, their team (TYLin Great Lakes) now forms the core of TYLin’s City Solutions practice—a whole-systems, end-to-end suite of advisory and planning services for creating and adapting urban environments for the future, ultimately making our metropolitan areas more accessible, smarter, safer, more resilient, more equitable, and more attractive to people and businesses.
TYLin (pronounced ‘T-Y Lin’) is a globally recognized full-service infrastructure consultancy, that purchased Sam Schwartz, LLC around October 2024. Regarding the possible development of the Arlington Park property by the Chicago Bears, the Village of Arlington Heights originally engaged the services Sam Schwartz, LLC, which now operates as TYLin Great Lakes.
TYLin was founded on June 1, 1954, by Tung-Yen Lin, a Chinese-American structural engineer.
At Monday night’s Village of Arlington Heights Board Meeting, Village Manager Randy Recklaus explained the updated Chicago Bears plans, and the recommended response by the Village of Arlington Heights planners.
Village Manager Randy Recklaus: “Back in September 2022, which seems like a long time ago now, the Village Board approved an agreement with Sam Schwartz LLC to conduct reviews of traffic and parking studies to be submitted by the Chicago Bears Football Club for their proposal for a new sports entertainment district, including an NFL stadium on the former Arlington Park site. While those studies were started back in 2022, the Bears paused them in 2023 due to disputes over the short and long-term property taxes for the site. As you all know, a few weeks back in December, the Village board and School Districts 15, 211 and 214, and the Bears all executed a Memorandum of Understanding that resolved the open issues related to property taxes.
“On February 13 2025, the Cook County Board of Review certified the assessment of the property outlined in the Memorandum of Understanding, and a week later the Bears sent the village a letter to us indicating that they have resumed their traffic and economic impact studies, and begun developing an updated concept plan for the Arlington Park site. Staff believes it is now necessary to reengage with our consulting team, so that all of this information can be properly vetted and evaluated. These studies are going to be crucial to determine the economic and financial viability of the project, and identify a plan for the infrastructure needed to support it. Among other things the club’s traffic study will analyze … new anticipated traffic patterns and volumes caused by their development concept, the capacity of existing roadways to support new traffic, and will identify any new infrastructure needed to make the project possible.
“The village’s consultant team will review their studies to ensure that we agree with their assumptions and methodology, and that all infrastructure impacts needed to support the project are included in the analysis.
“As per the 2022 predevelopment agreement that the club entered into with the village, the club will be reimbursing the village for its expenses for these peer review studies. Since 2022, Sam Schwartz has been purchased by TYLin, so an updated agreement is needed with them to move forward while the village continues to work with the Chicago Bears Football Club on these issues. It’s important to stress that there’s still much work to be done to determine if an NFL stadium sports entertainment district is feasible, desirable and would be beneficial to the community on this site.
“These studies are a very important step in that process, and so staff recommends approval of our resolution authorizing execution of the first amendment with the TYLin Group LLC for vehicular traffic and parking analytical services for the redevelopment of the Arlington International Racecourse property.”
Mayor Tom Hayes echoed Mr. Recklaus comments: “(t)hat this is just another step, but it’s a very important step that will allow us to get a little bit further down the road to our own exploration of this possibility. So I’m very happy to begin, really, our due diligence with these studies, as soon as possible, so that we can again make a determination on behalf of our residents — this community — whether or not a Chicago Bears stadium in the Village of Arlington Heights would be a good thing for us … and so, again yet to be determined, but we have a lot of work to do … and so I’m very happy that we’re at this point in the process, and I’m very encouraged about where we’re at in the process, but again as you said we still have a long way to go, but I’m certainly wholeheartedly in favor of this staff recommendation.”
Trustee Tingalia commented: “One really important thing that I really want to make sure everybody at home hears … who is paying for this?”
Village Manager Recklaus: “We will be reimbursed for the cost of the studies by the Chicago Bears Football Club.”
Trustee Tinaglia: “That’s exactly right, one of the wonderful things that we as a group accomplished here was … we were able to, two years ago or so, make certain that the petitioner, in this case the Bears, submitted I think something like a quarter of a million dollars into an account for escrow for these kinds of studies. Am I correct on that?”
Village Manager Recklaus: “It was an initial deposit in to escrow that was $150,000, and it can be replaced as new expenses are occurring.”
Trustee Tinaglia: “So that fund that’s all there for us to get this stuff done … it’s not coming out of our tax dollars (taxpayer’s) pockets, and we’ll work together with this petitioner to make sure it’s fabulous, right? ”
Trustee Bertucci: “So Randy one of the questions that I think is out there, ’cause I know I often get it get asked, is the timeline for our study, and then also for the Bear’s study … what can you share about that?”
Village Manager Recklaus: “Not much at this point. Once we receive the traffic studies, we’ll immediately, if this agreement is approved, begin working with them on reviewing it, seeing if our consultants agree with the methodology … work on the scope of that. If we think the scope of what was done needs to be expanded, any supplemental studies that may need to be done, which is also provided for in this agreement, and so this will be a conversation, obviously … making sure that the infrastructure created to manage traffic and parking is sufficient, is a major issue as part of our consideration. So it’s something we want to make sure we do thoughtfully, and so there isn’t a timeline on this, per se … it’s more what’s it gonna take to do this right.”
Recklaus added, “we’re gonna work as expeditiously as we can to make an efficient process and transparent process … but not knowing what we’re gonna be getting, we can’t say (what the timeline is) at this time.”
“(t)he other element of this planning is looking at the financial and economic impact, which is obviously important as well. We’re still working out the details of that for a consulting group on that, and that will be coming very soon as well.”
— Village Manager Recklaus (during motion phase)
Trustee Schwingbeck: “I would move to approve a resolution authorizing execution of the first amendment to agreement with TYLin Great Lakes, Inc., formerly Sam Schwartz, for vehicular traffic and parking and analytical services for the redevelopment of the Arlington International Racecourse property.”
Trustee Baldino seconded the motion.
Roll Call …
Trustee Schwingbeck? Yes,
Trustee Baldino? Yes,
Trustee Dunnington? Yes,
Trustee Beretucci? Yes,
Trustee Tinaglia? Yes,
Trustee Grasse? Yes,
Trustee LaBedz? Yes,
Trustee Shirley? Yes,
President Hayes? Yes.
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See a general promotional brand story (video) about TYLin, founded on June 1, 1954, by Tung-Yen Lin, a Chinese-American structural engineer (SOURCE: TYLin) in the CARDINAL NEWS article … Redevelopment? Combined Timeline for Chicago Bears and Arlington Heights Late Winter, Spring, Summer 2025