Skokie Dunkin' To Demolish 3 Houses To Allow For Double Drive-Thru

SKOKIE, IL — Village trustees voted Monday to approve zoning changes to allow for a fast food franchisee to demolish three homes to make way for a new, larger restaurant with two drive-thru lanes.

The owners of the 24-hour Dunkin' Donuts-Baskin-Robbins location at 5150 Touhy Ave. have purchased three residential properties on the cul-de-sac to the store's immediate north.

The village board voted in favor of the restaurant franchisees' plan to rezone those three houses — 5149, 5153 and 5157 Jarlath Ave. — from R2 Single Family to B2 Commercial zoning to allow for the new restaurant.

The Panjwani family has owned the location since 1991 and currently operates all Dunkin' locations in the village, Reena Panjwani, development director of Panjwani Network Restaurants, told Skokie plan commissioners last month.

Panjwani said the company started discussing what it would take to bring a drive-thru to the location with village community development staff in 2015.

"Staff basically told us that the only way that would be possible is if you were to acquire all three of the houses, which was a task in and of itself," Panjwani said. "But we were able to acquire all three houses that sit directly behind the location."

Property records show the franchisees purchased the trio of Jarlath Avenue properties for a combined $895,000 in January 2016 through a corporate entity called Skokie Property LLC.

With the emergence of COVID-19 and associated executive orders from Gov. J.B. Pritzker that limiting indoor dining, the franchisees desire for drive-thru lanes became more urgent. According to Panjwani, the 5150 Touhy Ave. location lost as much as 70 percent of sales because it lacked a drive-thru lane.

"The only reason we're doing this, obviously, is to have the potential for the drive-thru," Panjwani told trustees.

"It was, you know, a 'Tale of Two Cities,' the Dunkins that had drive-thrus thrived and the Dunkins that don't have drive-thrus are struggling to survive," she said. "Unfortunately, even in Skokie, the locations that we operate that don't have drive-thrus, you know the train station one we closed, and you know there may be one or two others that just don't make it because of the changing consumer patterns that really demand that drive-thru."

According to a memo from village staff, the proposed zoning map amendment is consistent with changes to commercial developments along Touhy Avenue, even though it is not consistent with the village's comprehensive plan, which designates the area as single-family land use.

At Monday's village board meeting, community development director Matt Brandmeyer said the current Dunkin' lot is very narrow and hard to redevelop, making it "functionally obsolete." He said every restaurant development proposed in the village since the start of the coronavirus pandemic has included increased drive-thru elements.

"In a couple months, you're going to see three more drive-thrus proposed," Brandmeyer told trustees. "We'll be reviewing those at plan commission. I mean, when it comes to restaurant space, that's where demand is."

Skokie village trustees voted unanimously to approve the plan in four out of the five votes necessary to permit it, which also included vacating the alley behind the restaurant.

Trustee James Johnson voted against the rezoning amendment, noting that the three houses set to be razed had been residential properties for the past 70 years.

"These homes are in a great location. They're a block from Laramie Park. They're a couple blocks walk from Fairview South School. These homes are right by the expressway. They're great for commuters," Johnson said. "I think destroying these three homes is kind of a waste, so for me, I would say that obviously this site is more suited for residential than commercial."

Mayor George Van Dusen said that he tried to talk to "a couple national coffee houses" regarding an area that village officials hope to redevelop.

"I was told by both of them, 'Sorry, the area where you would like us, we can't go because we can't put a drive-thru. So we won't even consider it, thank you very much,' and it didn't matter what you said. It was the drive-thru that was the deal-killer, and I don't know what we do about it," Van Dusen said. "But that's it."

This article originally appeared on the Skokie Patch