There won’t be any pedal pubs cruising downtown Naperville any time soon.
Naperville City Council voted to ban the bikes from downtown and arterial roads, citing increased traffic congestion as their main concern.
The original motion stated the pedal pubs would be banned from the entire city, but council decided to change the wording to limit the ban.
After Councilman John Krummen recused himself, five councilmembers voted to limit the ban while three were in favor of prohibiting them throughout Naperville.
“I don’t think our community views our downtown as an intense bar district,” said Councilman Kevin Coyne. “It’s a business center, lots of families. Really in no context was there a desire to see these in our city, not just in the downtown or anywhere.”
“I just don’t think this is the right fit for our community,” said Councilwoman Patricia Gustin. “I also don’t think we have the road accommodation or the width to be able to accommodate the equipment.”
But, several councilmembers stated they wanted to leave the door open to allow pedal pubs for special events.
“I don’t know if I want to do it town-wide just to provide some opportunities with the birthday parties and even parks,” said Councilman Paul Hinterlong. “Maybe there’s something that can be done in the parks. Especially with the ale fest – maybe it can be used as some kind of shuttle. It might come in handy in some instances.”
The Naperville Liquor Commission has already denied a request to allow alcohol on the bikes, and Mayor Steve Chirico reiterated that decision at the council meeting.
PedalPub representative Shane Dunn said they are willing to work with the city to create an alternate route that avoids the prohibited roads. They are one of two parties interested in opening a pedal pub business in Naperville.
“We have identified a few areas that it could work,” said Dunn. “We had a pretty good idea of the direction that this was going to go so that’s when we started looking to try to figure out other pockets of where this could work. So that possibility is there, but this does become a partnership and we can only go so far and do so much.”
City staff members will write up an ordinance to enact the ban and bring it to council to approve.
Naperville News 17’s Casey Krajewski reports.
