Tollway officials say that a local road would have to be closed in order to follow Mundelein’s proposal to place a toll plaza north of Mundelein on the planned Illinois Highway 53 extension, officials said Thursday.
Unhappy with the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority’s alternatives for where to place a toll-collection booth along the route, Mundelein officials last week recommended the alternative location just outside the village near Winchester Road.
After initial study, tollway officials decided that if a toll plaza were located there, a Winchester Road bridge would have to be built over the tollway, but that was not feasible because it would pose a safety hazard.
“The reason is because a bridge would block the line of sight going into a toll plaza,” said tollway spokesman David Loveday.
“People wouldn’t be able to see the signs or merge properly.”
The alternative to building a bridge would be to close Winchester where it would intersect the tollway, officials said.
“If they convince us it would be unsafe and unfeasible, it wouldn’t be realistic for us to pursue it,” Mundelein Mayor Marilyn Sindles said Thursday night after hearing of the problems with the site proposal.
Sindles spoke shortly before Thursday’s meeting of the Corridor Planning Council, a group of representatives from 10 municipalities that is working with road officials in planning the tollway.
Tollway officials originally had planned to announce their preferred plaza location, but that announcement will be delayed another four to six weeks, Loveday said, until all remaining alternatives are carefully considered by the tollway authority and the planning council.
“We don’t want this issue just hanging out there,” Loveday said. “We’re trying to get this done as fast as we can so we can move forward to the environmental impact study.”
About 40 people, some there to oppose the tollway, attended the meeting held in Lake Zurich Village Hall to discuss the tollway.
Toll officials said they are limited in where they can place a toll plaza along the extension. It cannot be on or near a curve. It cannot be too close to another interchange. It cannot be too close to wetlands. It cannot be in a heavily residential area.
Earlier this week, tollway officials scrapped one possible site calling for a single mainline plaza near Mechanics Grove School in Mundelein, just off Illinois Highway 176.
While opposition mounts to building any tollway through the middle of Lake County, several citizens groups were particularly vocal about not wanting a toll plaza near a school.
Two other proposed locations remain under consideration. One would be a single toll-collection booth system located just north of Highway 176 in Mundelein.
The other proposal is a dual-plaza, north-south concept that calls for toll booths in Hawthorn Woods, between Old McHenry and Gilmer Roads, and in Grayslake, along Illinois Highway 120 between U.S. Highway 45 and Almond Road.
On June 8, opponents rallied to complain about how the road would damage roadside vegetation, increase traffic congestion and taxes, threaten drinking water and cause potential flooding problems.
The 18-mile extension would run through the middle of Lake County from its current terminus at Lake-Cook Road north to Grayslake, then west to Richmond in northeastern McHenry County and east to Waukegan.
