Bensenville has enjoyed an exciting growth spurt during the past 12 to 18 months, according to Evan Summers, village manager. The village has welcomed everything from restaurants, retailers and industrial tenants, to new places to live, including apartments and single-family homes.
“Residents can now enjoy a number of new restaurants in the downtown, including Green Street Grille, Los Buenos Diaz and La Chiquita Taqueria. And just outside of downtown, Mama Maria’s has expanded their restaurant on York Road and added an outdoor patio and Bella’s Bistro Market has opened offering a wine bar, specialty market, sandwich and flatbread pizza menu and entertainment,” Summers said.
Bensenville also added some retail options, including Jim’s Liquor on Irving Park Road, JC Licht Paint in Brentwood Commons, a remodeled Grand Subaru dealership and three brand new fueling stations on Route 83 – Pilot, Thornton’s and Bryn Mawr Citgo. A new Holiday Inn is also being constructed next door to the existing Country Inn and Suites, doubling the number of hotel rooms available in Bensenville.
The village also experienced a strong growth year in their industrial market. Currently their industrial district only has a 3.5 percent vacancy rate and no empty land. So the Village is embarking on a renovation of several 1970s-era industrial properties totaling 450,000 square feet in order to transform them into Class A, state-of-the-art spaces. These new facilities are expected to be complete by December 2018.
Bensenville also welcomed the addition of Savino Del Bene (a freight forwarding and logistics firm); Brunner & Lay (a pneumatic and hydraulic tool accessory manufacturer); Schmid Tool (a precision CNC machining, turning, and custom assembly services firm); and AmTab Manufacturing (which makes mobile cafeteria tables, booths, stages, risers and logo, dry erase, folding, technology and activity tables). In all, these new firms have brought more than 200 new jobs to Bensenville recently and a number of long-time industrial firms have also been adding jobs and shifts.
Bensenville added a number of single-family homes and completed the A&E Luxury Apartments with 29 units on North Walnut Street. This increased level of residential investment contributed to a 21.4 percent increase in Bensenville home values from 2016 to 2017, according to the Illinois Association of Realtors.
“Bensenville is now attracting many new residents. Most are older Millennial young professionals who have been living in the city and now want to move to the suburbs,” Summers said. “Many of them are business travelers who want to live close to O’Hare International Airport. They have also heard about the high quality of our schools and the fact that they have plenty of available room for additional students.”