Prairie Parkway: A road to nowhere?

Do these morons like Foster ever drive on IL 47 when it is busy? Has he ever been through central Yorkville at school time in the afternoon when traffic backs up from 34 to the river? Has he been around the area where US 30 comes in? He wants to "fix" the road???? Build a new Highway away from this!!! Chicago needs an outer ring interstate to connect lower Mich into In into the south burbs and up and around the west up to I-43 area near Burlington, WIS!! What are they waiting for traffic to back up from Morris to Sugar Grove!!!!????

"Hastert was criticized for the way he and two partners earned more than $3 million on land they bought and sold near the route of the proposed highway". Although I'm not much of a Hastert fan, this charge is purely political. The subject property is miles from the proposed route.

Keep up the good work Bill Foster. Yes, kill that pork bloated monster that pork bloated Hastert and his porky buddies jammed on us, while they made a fortune.
By the way, why isn't Denny Hastert in prison? How is what he did any different than the scandal in the movie, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? He got a federal project approved with a huge earmark, one that helped make him a fortune on his own real estate investment. Isn't there a law against that?
And thank you Bill Foster for trying to clean up the dirty messes that greedy Dennis Hastert left behind.

The property Hastert bought is about 3 miles from the proposed Parkway, about exactly where you would want to be for maximum benefit. Also note that Hastert and his partner tried to hide the investment through a secret trust. It took a D.C. watchdog group with some specific expertise to finally uncover the scheme.

Fox News Channel had an excellent documentary on this last year that made Hastert look very, very bad.

Hastert was always only about himself. Thank goodness he's gone.

The real problem is unchecked population growth. When will people stop having too many children? When the Chicago suburbs merge with Rock Island?

Regardless of Hastert's motives, the fact remains that there is very poor accessibility to major expressways in the far western suburbs of Kane and Kendall county. This is a rapidly growing area due to the push west for affordable housing and it needs convenient access to 88 and 80. Routes like 47, 34, 30 and 31 are the main roads out there and they are getting very busy. Areas like Yorkville, Oswego, Sugar Grove, St. Charles, Geneva, etc. would all benefit from a new artery to the highway system - not just for residents who commute but also for truck drivers who service businesses in those areas.

Good, it is not vital to the area or the region. Sometime it is the times you say no to the way things were done in the pasta that makes one green. Building out another highway spur into farmland for more Sprawlville McMansions is not a way to make the changes we need.

Ah, the good old days when Denny the Blimp got pork to benefit himself financially and also around the middle.

That way, the Bad Professor is at again. Do everyone a favor, Fess, go back to Fermi Lab and out of DC.

This is just the reason the demos are in charge and of course they are doing the same thing. They are all a bunch of crooks and what are we going to do. We are in a sorry mess and it sure isn't getting ant better with Obama.

Build the highway, it has already been approved, and what chance do you have to get more money for it later if you switch it over to other projects now. It doesn't quite make sense to skip the main artery now and beef up smaller roads in the area. If the Dems are so concerned with stimulus and getting people working, they should get the highway building started as soon as possible, and it will help spur growth in the area. Switching the funding to local roads is just going to get people moving around already existing development and this is not going to spur anything, only a quicker trip to the local Starbucks.

It appears to be more of a power struggle.

Either build the road or stop issuing building permits out there. Look what a mess McHenry County is. 250K people and no Interstate Highway! That mess is just being extended southward to the 80 Freeway.

How about spending the money on public transportation to alleviate the traffic mess?

Go Foster wrote:

Keep up the good work Bill Foster. Yes, kill that pork bloated monster that pork bloated Hastert and his porky buddies jammed on us, while they made a fortune.
By the way, why isn't Denny Hastert in prison? How is what he did any different than the scandal in the movie, Mr. Smith Goes to Washington? He got a federal project approved with a huge earmark, one that helped make him a fortune on his own real estate investment. Isn't there a law against that?
And thank you Bill Foster for trying to clean up the dirty messes that greedy Dennis Hastert left behind.

Man if you want to send Hastert to prison for THAT, I have a couple of democrats you can add to your list. Starting with Obama himself who sent a million dollar earmark to UIC hospitals that benefited his wife with a 300% salary increase. Then you can add his chief of staff Rahm Emanual who has all kinds of these real estate deals as a US congressman. You can take the whole Daley administration with you. Diane Fienstein D- Corruption. Gave a $45 million dollar earmark to the FDIC when her husband received an insider contract to sell off FDIC foreclosures.

But something tells me you don't want any of these democrats going to jail right?

Jim wrote:

Good, it is not vital to the area or the region. Sometime it is the times you say no to the way things were done in the pasta that makes one green. Building out another highway spur into farmland for more Sprawlville McMansions is not a way to make the changes we need.

This is a bit naive.

The Chicago area. especially the SW corner, is a major distribution hub. Having this circumferential highway in place will allow large amounts of that traffic to almost totally bypass inner highways like 294 and 355 freeing up traffic for the bulk of the region.

That seems like a good idea.

I88 to I-80 isn't enough, it needs to reach from I-90 all the way down to I-80. that would provide an effective route bypass most of the inner roads and allowing access to the distribution areas in the SW and allowing traffic to effectively bypass all the way to Indiana.

This road is much too far out to "cause" sprawl but will increase the overall efficiency of the Chicago transportation system. I-39 could have done some of this but it is way too far west and it adds so much time that even with the tie-ups closer in, it's a net time loser when considered as a bypass.

sad wrote:

How about spending the money on public transportation to alleviate the traffic mess?

Check your map - this isn't a "public" transportation issue because this isn't a "commuter" route.

This isn't a classic urban public transportation issue unless the public is interested in moving hundreds of 53' boxes on the subway.

Before you just bleat "public" transportation from thousands of miles away, you ought to get hip to the geography involved.

sad wrote:

How about spending the money on public transportation to alleviate the traffic mess?

Yeah lets drive more PACE busses around 90% empty all day.

many suburban residents hate it when government gives money to mass transit. Well, just like those who believe mass transit should pay for itself, I believe that folks who drive on roads should bear the true cost of them. This would include construction, upkeep, and environmental mitigation costs. All things that are highly subsidized.

Besides, Americans need to rethink how we build our suburbs and cities. Creating communities that foster pedestrian activity and getting people out of their cars is important for personal health and cleaner air for all. Building highways seems counter-productive to that goal.

Ahh got to love sprawl. I need a more room than I need. People really believe they can't raise their kids in a 1,800 3 bd rm house but need a 2,700 st ft 5 bd house (even though they have 2 kids) so they justify moving out to Oswego.

They say ya I want to escape higher taxes. Well I hate Stroger as much as the next guy but you know what I'd rather pay higher taxes that go to the US than spend more in gas for my car because I have to drive everywhere and pay much more to heat my home. Well that money goes to big oil companies and our buddy Hugo or a prince in Saudi Arabia. Suddenly paying Stroger looks like the lesser of two evils.

Oh wait I moved to escape crime. Ya because the in-fill suburbs of Wheaton, LaGrange, Palos, Des Plaines have so much crime?

As soon as Oswego (or what have you) fills up they will move even farther west.