The state police in Illinois, Indiana and Michigan vow they are taking back Interstate Highway 94 from the aggressive drivers who have turned the expressway into danger zones.
The tri-state crackdown along I-94 started over the weekend and will continue through the summer. No violators will get off with just a warning, officials said.
“We will target aggressive drivers who are speeding, following too closely and changing lanes unsafely,” said Illinois State Police Lt. Leonard Stallworth. “We will focus our efforts on all vehicles traveling in an unsafe or hazardous manner.”
The special enforcement in the Chicago area will be focused on portions of the Tri-State and Edens Expressways, run south to the Kennedy Expressway through downtown and continue south to the Dan Ryan Expressway.
Seat-belt laws will also be vigorously enforced, the troopers said.
Tollway money woes
Illinois tollway board Chairman Arthur Philip may wish he could convert the cash depicted on his snazzy tie to the real thing.
Philip, the brother of state Senate President James “Pate” Philip (R-Wood Dale), met with the Tribune’s editorial board Tuesday seeking support for a $5.5 billion toll hike. Wearing a hard-to-miss tie emblazoned with large denominations of U.S. currency, Philip defended the tollway authority against renewed accusations that it loses millions of dollars because of poor management, corruption and a patronage system larded with unnecessary jobs.
Philip said the toll authority is clean, pork-free and among the most efficiently operated agencies in the state. He also charged that his critics, chief among them state Rep. Jeffrey Schoenberg (D-Evanston) and state Sen. Kathy Parker (R-Northbrook), are launching baseless attacks to win their next elections.
At public hearings held the next day in the 12 counties served by the toll authority, hundreds of drivers used words including “arrogance,” “unaccountability” and “chutzpah” to register their opposition to the proposed toll increase, from 40 to 75 cents per toss for cars.
Also Wednesday, the Senate voted to delay any toll hike until at least June 2003. The measure was sponsored by Parker. If approved by the House, it would also require a management audit of the toll authority and direct the tollway’s director, Tom Cuculich, to submit a 20-year strategic master plan for the toll system by Dec. 31. Legislation sponsored by Schoenberg in the House would require a three-fifths vote of the General Assembly to pass a toll increase.
By Thursday, after digesting the public hearings and witnessing the pre-emptive strikes in the General Assembly against the toll hikes, Gov. George Ryan all but declared the tollway’s reconstruction proposal dead on arrival.
Among the next questions is, How many of the eight tollway board members who were appointed by Ryan to the nine-member board will side with the lame duck governor?
Time to make decisions is running short.
The base layer of concrete on much of the tollway system is old and beyond repair. The reason drivers see the same stretch of tollway being re-asphalted every few years–causing nightmarish congestion–is because a bandage is being used when only surgery will help. The tollway’s budget books say that in two years, the authority won’t have enough money for maintenance.
To fix all that ails the tollway–yet not guarantee that congestion levels would be significantly eased in the future–a second round of toll hikes would be necessary in no more than eight years to pay for the second half of the $5.5 billion rehabilitation plan.
All in all, it was a great week for Metra.
W & W closed
The intersection of Wabash Avenue and Wacker Drive and the Wabash Bridge was closed before Monday morning’scommuter rush and will remain off-limits through November. Chicago transportation officials recommend drivers use Michigan Avenue or State Street as alternates.
The intersections at Clark Street and Wacker and at Franklin Street and Wacker are scheduled to reopen in mid-May. At the same time, the Lake Street and Wacker intersection will close for rebuilding.
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Read recent Getting Around columns at bancodeprofissionais.com/go/gettingaround. Contact Getting Around at jhilkevitch@tribune.com or c/o the Chicago Tribune, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611.
