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Elburn Herald
January 15, 2003

IDOT hosts pair of Parkway open houses

by Susan O'Neill

The Illinois Department of Transportation (IDOT) will hold two public open houses to provide information about the Phase One Prairie Parkway Engineering Study recently begun by the Chicago-based engineering firm of Parsons, Brinckerhoff, Quade and Douglas in conjunction.

Representatives from both organizations will be present at the open houses to answer questions and to gain public input. Smith Engineering, located in Yorkville, has been named as the local subcontractor to work on the study, and representatives from the firm will likely attend the meetings as well, said IDOT Project Engineer Tom Magolan.

"We're expecting several hundred people at each meeting," said IDOT representative and Prairie Parkway Project Manager Rick Powell, adding that they wanted to staff the meeting with enough representatives so that people would be able to have their questions answered on a one-on-one basis. The open houses will include a Power Point presentation and exhibits related to the study, in addition to the opportunity to ask questions. Following the meetings, residents are encouraged to visit the Prairie Parkway website, www.prairie-parkway.com, to learn more about the study and to express their ideas or concerns.

A separate meeting has been scheduled with local public officials for Thursday, Jan. 16. According to Powell, the same information will be presented at this meeting, with an opportunity for the officials to ask questions. Powell explained that these officials will be fielding questions from the general public, so this meeting is an opportunity to brief them on the study.

The meeting with officials has a different purpose, explained Powell, in that IDOT is looking for information from the local officials regarding development plans, land use plans, transportation plans and employment data such as new employers moving into the area. According to Powell, this will be IDOT's initial contact with officials in the area, which will include mayors, village presidents, state representatives, county board chairpersons and township road commissioners, as well as staff professionals including county and village engineers, land planners and highway superintendents.

According to Magolan, the study will progress one step at a time. The first year, he explained, will be mainly data collection of the existing roadway system and current traffic and problem areas and patterns, as well as the development of models to forecast what traffic may look like up to the year 2030. During this time, public opinion surveys and focus groups will be used to gain input from local residents.

If enough problems are found, said Powell, a range of alternatives will be explored, including an analysis of the environmental, social and economic concerns. He emphasized that the study is separate from the siting of the corridor for the outer beltway, and that the highway is just one of the many solutions that will be explored.

Powell said one of the solutions to be looked at will be to expand the existing system by widening existing roads, including Route 47. He also noted that there is a lack of public transit options west of the Fox River, and that they will look at trains or buses or a combination of these options, as well as ride sharing, van pooling and other ways to squeeze extra capacity out of the existing system.

"There's a recognition that we can't just keep adding lanes," he said.

Advanced technology allows transportation officials to look at Intelligent Transportation Systems, such as reversible lanes, signal timing and lane metering, or stoplights that monitor traffic entering highways, such as those that are used closer to the city of Chicago.

The siting of the corridor is a planning tool, he said, in reaction to a tremendous amount of growth in Kane and Kendall counties.

"The need has not been established to build a new highway," Powell said.

He described the corridor as a preemptive move to protect the land against further development while IDOT determines the transportation needs.

"We lost a lot of good options in the east (by not siting a corridor there earlier)," he explained.

"We will be looking over the state's shoulder to make sure that they are honest and thorough in studying the needs and that they consider all options, and not just the outer beltway," said Jan Strasma, head of Citizens Against the Sprawlway, the organization opposing the beltway.

He added that opponents to the beltway will be in attendance at the upcoming public meetings.

Strasma noted that IDOT representatives have been careful to say that all alternatives will be explored, and that the decision to build a highway has not been made, yet the phase I study has been named the Prairie Parkway Study.

"They announced the outer beltway, they recorded the corridor for the beltway calling it the Prairie Parkway, and now they have begun a study calling it the Prairie Parkway. And now they want us to believe that their mind is wide open," he said. "They've made up their mind."

"By recording the corridor they have said the outer beltway is the answer," said Strasma, "and now they're spending $18 million in taxpayer's money to figure out what the questions are."

Powell explained that the final version of the Prairie Parkway may or may not include the corridor currently sited.

"The Prairie Parkway may end up being a modified alignment along Route 47. We may end up using part, all or none of the existing corridor," he said.

Marvel Davis, one of the landowners affected by the siting of the outer beltway corridor, lamented IDOT's moving forward with the project. She talked about the acres of farmland that will be destroyed and the watersheds likely to be affected if IDOT builds this highway.