By Matthew DeFour
Staff writer

YORKVILLE — Now that the state has narrowed down the possible routes for the proposed Prairie Parkway, Kendall County is considering additional interchanges on three county roads.

The Kendall County Board is expected to vote today on a highway committee recommendation for Prairie Parkway interchanges at Galena Road, Caton Farm Road and Grove Road.

The highway committee has kicked around the issue periodically in the last two years, but this is the first time it has recommended that the county should approach the Illinois Department of Transportation about extra interchanges, according to committee chairman and board member John Purcell.

"We've talked about it," Purcell said. "But it's kind of hard to guess where to put an intersection if you don't know where the road is going."

The Illinois Department of Transportation plans to build five interchanges on the 33-mile corridor in addition to the endpoints at Interstates 80 and 88.

The proposed connections would be on state routes 52, 47, 71 and 34 in Kendall County and Route 30 in Kane County.

Additional interchanges could cost between $5 million and $10 million each, but the local governments would likely be responsible for much of the funding, according to IDOT project engineer Rick Powell.

"If the communities wanted additional access points, it would have to be requested," Powell said. "Who pays for it is another question."

Additionally, the Federal Highway Administration has specific criteria for the distance between access points on highways. More interchanges potentially create more accidents, Powell noted.

"Whenever we justify an interchange, it has to be shown that the benefits outweigh the potential safety drawbacks," Powell said.

Earlier this month, IDOT announced that the parkway likely would follow the originally proposed route from I-88 near Kaneville through Big Rock Township between Yorkville and Plano and then either south to I-80 west of Morris, or southeast to I-80 west of Minooka. IDOT identified nearly the same route in 2001 for the 400-foot-wide protected corridor intended to shield the land from development.

In July, the Kendall County Board narrowly voted 6-4 to support the route that extends southeast to Minooka. Board Chairman John Church, who voted against the July proposal, said it was a change in philosophy for the committee to make last week's recommendation.

"I was surprised they said anything about it," Church said. "It's premature to be talking about interchanges on county roads for the Prairie Parkway."

Kane County outlook

The Kane County Board has yet to endorse any specific route for the Prairie Parkway, though county engineer Carl Schoedel said the board eventually will make similar recommendations for county road interchanges.

"We're still in the process of considering which locations might be appropriate," Schoedel said. "Our approach is to be supportive of the process that IDOT is using, to make sure that we continue to have a voice and a seat at the table."

Schoedel noted that there's still plenty of time to have the discussion about interchanges, especially as IDOT doesn't expect to break ground on the Prairie Parkway project until 2009.

That's not to say that Kane County isn't making plans. The county plans to engage officials in Kendall, McHenry and DeKalb counties about long-term regional transportation needs and costs.

Last week, the Kendall highway committee reviewed a map received from Kane which depicted major bridge, interchange and intersection improvements for the western suburbs. County departments are being asked to brainstorm future projects to accommodate growth, Schoedel said.

The funding initiative, which Kane County officials haven't detailed publicly yet, is intended to raise awareness of the costs of key elements of future transportation projects, and to lay the groundwork for funding requests at the state and federal levels, including the next six-year federal transportation bill.

The current $287 billion transportation bill was signed by President Bush earlier this year in Kendall County, and appropriated $6 billion for Illinois, including $207 million for the Prairie Parkway.

"This is a recognition that we really need to start looking ahead to the next transportation bill," Schoedel said. "There are some major infrastructure needs that are peppered throughout this region."