No Trespassing Signs Mark End of the Road for Strolls in DG Airpark

For more than 20 years, Darien residents who live in the Brookeridge Creek subdivision have enjoyed casual walks through its tree-lined streets—all of them.

But in mid May, a no trespassing sign appeared beside a hump of earth that divides the Darien side of 86th Street from where it extends into Brookeridge Airpark, a residential airport in unincorporated Downers Grove.

The DuPage County Sheriff’s Office followed up last week with a letter warning Darien residents that walking through the airpark on 86th Street and Kearney Road could result in criminal charges. 

Residents of the area that includes Kearney and Creekside Lane joined Ward 5 Alderman Joe Marchese—who also lives in the neighborhood—in denouncing the new rules Monday at the meeting. 

The letter from the Sheriff’s Office, written by Cpl. David Kotovsky, said that “recent incidents that compromise safety” prompted the changes. 

“Those sections of roadway double as taxiways for planes and are maintained by area residents,” Kotovsky wrote. 

Kotovsky did not elaborate on the incidents in the letter. Airpark residents will still be able to walk the streets freely, he wrote. (Darien Patch will reach out to Kotovsky Tuesday for more information.)

Marchese denied that people from Darien walking along 86th Street or Kearney Road posed any safety concerns.

“There have been no incidents of safety hazards (involving pedestrians) in Brookeridge Creek,” he said. 

Rather, Marchese asserted that a Brookeridge resident who wishes to keep a plane in a hangar attached to his home requested the signs because of liability concerns. Marchese did not release the name of the resident, who has not yet constructed the hangar.

Ron DeSanto, who said he’s lived on Creekside Lane for 20 years, said the only safety incidents in his memory involve planes crashing or veering off the runway. 

“If 86th Street truly is a private road, I understand (the no trespassing signs),” he said. “But if one person is controlling it, something else has to be done.” 

The letter acknowledged “the situation may come as a surprise to some of you,” but said that airpark residents have a right to limit pedestrian traffic.

Darien Park District Commissioner Neil Christensen said he was offended both by the content of the letter as well as the fact that the Sheriff’s Office spent taxpayer money to send it. 

“I can see people are walking around all the time,” not all of whom are Darien residents, he said. “We were singled out only because we were the closest ones. I thought that was a misappropriation of funds by the county.”

Marchese said he would organize a meeting between Darien residents and Bob Siegfried, the airpark’s association president.

“The reason you see the disappointment,” Marchese said, “it’s just a massive change in the way we live our lives in that subdivision.”

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