I’ve got this gut feeling that the Illiana Expressway — at a minimum, linking Interstate 65 and Illinois 394 — never will be built.

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Optimist turns pessimistic over Illiana Expressway

Rather than surprise everyone when the study is completed, state lawmakers on the Illiana oversight committee need to meet this summer to hear progress and offer guidance so the process will go more smoothly this time. And keep the public updated along the way.

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NWI.com calls for Illiana Expressway study group to meet

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Blog Support For Illiana Expressway

The first of six Illiana Expressway studies has fixed the boundaries of the proposed highway that will connect I-65 to I-57.  Within those boundaries, Illiana Expressway planners will explore a northern, central and southern Illiana Expressway route.

The Illiana Expressway will run through Lake County — sorry Porter County, people and trucks will have to keep traveling on I-94, US 30, West County Road 100 South or State Road 2 to get to Valparaiso and other locations in the county from I-65.

According to the Northwest Indiana Times, the Illiana Expressway feasibility study will look at placing the Illiana Expressway within these boundaries:

North: 1/4 mile north of US 30.

South: Kankakee River (Lake County boundary)

East: I-65

West: 1/2 mile west of US 45 in Illinois.

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Three Plans For Illiana Expressway

The real opposition, the moneyed, vocal opposition, is coming from a different group: the NIMBYs. (NIMBY stands for “not in my back yard.”)

In some ways, it’s understandable. Given a choice, most everyone would prefer not to have a major thoroughfare running right by their neighborhood. If it were possible, we’d all like to live in the peace and quiet of a quaint nineteenth century village, while having all the modern conveniences at the same time. But, of course, that isn’t possible. There are always tradeoffs.

If each sides on the Illiana Expressway issue have to give a little, what should that be?

Can we grow Lake County, Indiana without the Illiana Expressway? (And, that assumes that growth is good — there are some who think otherwise).

How do we solve inevitable east-west traffic congestion on I-80 / I-94 — the Borman Expressway — and US 30 if we don’t build the Illiana Expressway?

Is there a way to build the Illiana Expressway that will be a win-win for all? Or, will it always be a “binary” issue — you’re either for it or opposed to it?

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Thoughts on NIMBY

Writes Joseph Ryan of the Daily Herald:

Tollway officials announced last month that they would look at building a Route 53 north extension, the West suburban Prairie Parkway, the O’Hare western bypass and the south suburban Illiana Expressway.

They also are considering tolls on the Eisenhower Expressway and raising fees during rush hour to discourage congestion.

The success of all these projects hinges on Open Road Tolling, which eliminated backups caused by cars lining up to pay their tolls in favor of electronic charges. If the electronic system that catches toll cheats in I-PASS lanes isn’t sound, experts say, the public may find it that much harder to accept the expansions officials envision.

“This will really erode public confidence in (the tollway’s) ability to carry out what they are supposed to do,” said Joseph DiJohn, director of the University of Chicago’s Metropolitan Transportation Support Initiative.

“It will make it very difficult to get public support” for future projects, he added, if the problems aren’t fixed.

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Report: Catching Toll Cheaters Key To Illiana Expressway Success

Don’t be surprised if area officials now start pushing hard for the Peotone airport and the Illiana expressway in 2008, Greuling predicted.

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Will County To Push For Illiana Expressway

While I was driving on the four lane road cutting through a large swath of Northern Indiana farmland and undeveloped rural lands, I wondered if there was opposition to build that highway when it was first proposed?  I haven’t heard of any, but that doesn’t mean that there weren’t anti US 30 groups rallying during the early 20th century.

Is the difference the private-public nature of the proposal?

Could it be the tolls?

Could it be opposition to anything that could connect into the NAFTA / NASCO highway system?

I wonder if the Illiana Expressway would be more acceptable to people if there were guarantees that bridges or underpasses would be built to allow easy crossing of the highway?

Just some thoughts.  Feel free to elaborate and enlighten us with your viewpoints.

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Driving on US 30 While Thinking Of Illiana

The year ended, too, with the Illiana Expressway, light commuter rail to Kankakee, and the Third Airport all remaining in the “talk and plan” stage. The most likely of the three is the airport, which will be grounded as long as people remain more concerned over who’s in charge instead of what gets done.

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All Talk & Plan

EZ-PASS Interoperability issues:

Drivers get stuck in the iZoom lanes and not because they are foolish and not paying attention.

There still seem to be some interoperability issues between I-PASS transponders and the iZoom system where it takes time for the Indiana Toll Road’s iZoom system to get word from the Illinois Tollroad’s I-PASS system that there is money in the account.

I’ve had my I-PASS tag read “invalid tag” or “low balance” or something similar even though I know there is money in my I-PASS account because I’ve checked Illinois’ GetIPASS.com website before traveling.  I haven’t figured out the lag time, but today my I-PASS account successfully recharged about five hours before I traveled on the Indiana Toll Road and discovered the electronic toll RFID device wasn’t valid on the iZoom system.

Was the delay because of the new year?

I don’t know if it is an issue on Illinois’ or Indiana’s side, but it is something that should be fixed because it would explain why every so often drivers are stuck at a barrier waving their arm I-PASS in hand hoping that it will be read by the iZoom system.  Some of those drivers stuck behind the gate legitimately thought their transponders would work properly in the iZoom system.

Also, it was frigid today — I wonder if that could have been causing problems?

I’ll have to see next time I travel on the Illinois Tollway if my IPASS transponder is working correctly.

The GetIzoom.com website requires users to disable all pop-up blocking:

I have several different toolbars that block popups, in addition to Firefox’s own pop-up blocker. Having to go to the option panels of all of those programs to turn off popup blocking before being able to read iZoom’s FAQ is silly when Illinois’ IPASS website doesn’t require the same.

Never fear, I fired up Internet Explorer and disabled pop-up blocking and was able to read everything.  But, it was a pain to have to switch browsers so that I wouldn’t have to fiddle around with control panels and options to allow pop-ups where information in a FAQ could just as easily been displayed without pop-ups.

Requiring users to shut off pop-up blocking software is a hassle that could dissuade someone from digging into the iZoom site or force them to give up and call the more costly toll free number.

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iZoom Doesn’t Always Play Well With IPASS