The next time you climb behind the wheel, consider that the number of miles driven in a single day in the Chicago area is equivalent to more than 300 round-trips to the moon.
One small trip to work. One giant loss of productivity for mankind.
On the average day in 1996, all of us drivers in the region collectively spun our odometers ahead more than 144 million miles, according to an analysis of state numbers conducted by the Chicago Area Transportation Study. That’s like driving to the sun (92,957,000 miles) and halfway home, perhaps stopping along the way to take a meteor shower.
Although traffic congestion is hardly unique to our region, northeastern Illinois is a member of a select club of 26 urban areas inundated with so many more cars and trucks than highway capacity can accommodate that it’s unlikely a balance will ever be restored, according to a study by the Federal Highway Administration.
Look at suburban Cook County, the volume leader in the six counties: More than 39 million miles traveled each day in 1980, rising to almost 51 million miles a decade later and exceeding 55 million miles in 1996, according to the Illinois Department of Transportation. That’s a 41 percent increase over the 16-year span.
And in the much smaller but quickly growing McHenry County, average daily vehicle miles rose nearly 100 percent between 1980 and 1996. The story is similar in DuPage, Will, Kendall and–to a lesser extent–Kane and Lake Counties.
Meanwhile, new-road construction has grown a puny 1 percent in Illinois over the last 10 years, and IDOT has no plans in its long-range outlook to add any more, focusing instead on shoring up and expanding major arterial streets. The only possibility is building up the tollway system, but the proposed Interstate Highway 355 South extension is stuck in court and the Interstate 355 North extension is the subject of a cost-benefit evaluation to see if it is really needed. Many folks, home owners and environmentalists among them, oppose both projects.
Is there really no solution, short of hypnotizing the car-crazed masses and repeatedly whispering, “transit . . . transit”?
“Our rush hours are already incredibly long and they will continue to get longer,” said Carla Berroyer, IDOT’s chief of urban program planning. “About the only bright spot I can find is that it’s even worse in Sun Belt cities like Phoenix, Atlanta and Orlando.”
Transport tidbits: Ouch! Backed-up traffic, gridlocked intersections and clogged parking lot driveways will continue until late November on Cicero Avenue on the Southwest Side due to a paving project between 72nd and 95th Streets that has shut down two lanes of traffic in each direction during the daytime. Yo, IDOT: How about considering spending the extra bucks for night-time work on such a major project that has choked a part of the city and four southern suburbs?
. . . Pace has opened a park-and-ride facility in Elk Grove Village for northwest suburban residents who commute to jobs near O’Hare International Airport or in Chicago. The commuter lot, in the Northwest Point Business Park just off Arlington Heights Road and south of the Northwest Tollway, is served by Pace buses that connect with the CTA station in Rosemont along the Blue Line.
. . . The Chicago Transit Authority is now selling transit cards and monthly passes at its Internet Web site, www.transitchicago.com. Ten-ride Metra tickets are available at www.metrarail.com.
Poetry in motion? And, finally, Walter G. of Nantucket, er, West Charleston Street in Chicago, writes:
There once was a street closed forever
When will it open? Seems never!
Can you do some explainin’
’bout construction on Damen?
North of Fullerton it long has been severed
Hey, OK, here goes, Wally:
The detour ‘tween Elston and Diversey
Surely went from bad to worsey
But please do not quiver
For work over the river
Will be done in December, have mercy
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Got a commuting question or a favorite Limerick? Write to Getting Around, c/o Chicago Tribune, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, Ill. 60611-4041. E-mail jhilkevitch@tribune.com
