State and local transportation planners are just now catching up to dramatic changes in travel patterns that have developed in the corridor between Cook and DuPage Counties since many of the roads and highways were built half a century ago.
The Cook-DuPage corridor, centered primarily on the Eisenhower Expressway (Interstate Highway 290) and the Reagan Memorial Tollway (Interstate Highway 88), handles almost 4 million daily trips by vehicles and mass-transit passengers. That’s strictly the count for local traffic; it doesn’t include pass-through trips, for instance, made by truckers on long-distance runs.
Increasing population in the corridor–up 20 percent to a total of 1.1 million residents since 1970–and a doubling of employment to almost 750,000 jobs over the same period have led to nearly constant congestion that has hit home on quality-of-life issues.
The biggest travel segment is the more than 426,000 daily work trips that originate in the western suburbs of Cook, DuPage and Kane County and are destined for Chicago, according to a new travel-market analysis being conducted by the Regional Transportation Authority and the Illinois Department of Transportation.
Arriving in second place is the reverse commute that originates east of Cicero Avenue in Chicago and ends in outlying areas of the city and the west suburbs of Cook, DuPage and Kane. That accounts for 246,000 daily work trips, the analysis found.
The largest intersuburban travel market–more than 113,000 daily work trips–spans the eastern two-thirds of DuPage, northern Cook and northwest Will County.
There are more numbers in the report, and they are all staggering to anyone who values mobility, using their time productively and making it home for dinner and family.
“Today’s travel markets are not performing well at all” because of congestion, said John DeLaurentis, RTA planning director. “This study has helped us get our hands around the mobility needs in the corridor and get a sense of where people are going. Over the next year, we, along with IDOT, will analyze mass transit and road projects proposed for the region and start matching them up to meet the need.”
Prairie Parkway meetings: Traffic jams are getting horrid, as well, in the area far west of Chicago that only a few years ago wasn’t considered part of the greater metropolitan area.
Now, many transportation and land-use planners refer to the “seven-county Chicago area.”
And a state list of alternatives under study for road and mass-transit improvements in the far, far western suburbs will be presented during public meetings this week.
The alternatives will include a proposed Prairie Parkway north-south freeway connecting Interstate Highways 88 and 80 in Kane, Kendall and Grundy Counties, IDOT said.
The public meetings will be held from 5:30 to 8 p.m. with the first meeting Tuesday at Yorkville Middle School, 702 Game Farm Rd.; and Wednesday at White Oak Elementary School, 2001 Dupont Ave., Morris.
Making I-PASS E-Z: A lot of “snowbirds” who will flee the Chicago area over the winter have asked Getting Around whether the recent expansion of the I-PASS toll-collection system to other states includes Florida and other Southern climates.
Sorry, it doesn’t. But in addition to using I-PASS on the Illinois Tollway and the Chicago Skyway, motorists can now use their I-PASS transponders to pay tolls on highways, bridges and tunnels of the E-ZPass system in Pennsylvania, Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland, Delaware, New Jersey, New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine. Find more information at www.illinoistollway.com and click on E-ZPass.
Bridge construction alerts: The old sidewalks on the Harrison Street Bridge over the Chicago River are being replaced starting Monday, according to the Chicago Department of Transportation. A Fiberglas material will be used to make the walking surface less slippery when wet. Harrison will remain open to motorists and pedestrians through completion of the project in February, CDOT said, but drivers should expect temporary land closings.
Vendors at the Maxwell Street Market and drivers who use the Canal Street viaduct at 16th Street will be affected by the bridge reconstruction that starts after the evening rush period Monday. Traffic will be reduced to one lane in each direction between 14th and 18th Streets during construction, CDOT said. In addition to rebuilding the 75-year-old viaduct, the roadway will be reconstructed. To accommodate the displacement of vendors at the Maxwell Street Market, the limits of the market are being temporarily expanded north and south on Canal and onto Taylor Street between Canal and Clinton Street.
Bicycle reality show: A weekly call-in TV show called “Bike Traffic Live” begins Thursday on the Chicago Access Network Television (CAN TV21).
The show, which will air at 5 p.m. Thursdays, will promote bicycle safety and encourage more people to integrate bikes into their commute, according to the Chicagoland Bicycle Federation, co-producer of the show. It will not appear on suburban cable-access channels.
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Contact Getting Around at jhilkevitch@tribune.com or c/o the Chicago Tribune, 435 N. Michigan Ave., Chicago, IL 60611. Read recent columns at bancodeprofissionais.com. Enter “Getting Around” in the search field.
