A brand-new apartment on the 300 block of W. Washington St. was built in 2019 right where a vintage Victorian home once stood and residents say it doesn’t match the neighborhood.

O’Rourke, a 77-year-old health education expert with a passion for communities, founded the South Willis Neighborhood Group 35 years ago and has been running it ever since.

The former two-way road is temporarily a one-way, with drivers waiting for their turn to cross on either side of a traffic signal. Streets intersecting streets like Bradley Avenue and Bellefontaine Street have been closed off completely. Because of this, residents have had to inevitably traverse through traffic build-ups created on the road just to enter and exit their community.

Only one house on the north side of Hedge Road has been demolished. Several more have been vacated recently, with the rest still being occupied. Yet by 2022, all of the 46 properties on the three-block section are scheduled for demolition and purchase by the City of Champaign, in order to make way for a drainage pond to be built between Hedge Road and the Norfolk Southern railroad tracks.

The neighborhood was zoned “light industrial.” This ordinance prohibited any resident from making any substantial repairs to their home. This was over 45 years ago. Today, despite news articles and the efforts of James and his former colleagues, Wilbur Heights remains a “hodge-podge” of residential and commercial properties.

Urbana city officials acknowledge the crumbling conditions of Busey Avenue between Green Street and Illinois Avenue, but ask residents to wait another two years…

The apartment complex tucked into the 2500 block of West Springfield Ave. in Champaign, Illinois, has been home to multiple fatal shootings over the last decade. The most recent shooting took the life of a 21-year-old Scott Roth on May 5, earlier this year, according to Champaign Police Reports.