Interstate 290 (Illinois)

Infobox road
state=IL
route=290
type=I
maint=Illinois DOT


alternate_name=Dwight D. Eisenhower Expressway
length_mi=29.84
length_round=2
length_ref= [http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/reports/routefinder/table2.htm Route Log- Auxiliary Routes of the Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways - Table 2] ]
year_established=1955 (finished 1972)
direction_a=West
terminus_a=Jct|state=IL|I|90|IL|53 in Rolling Meadows
junction=Jct|state=IL|I|355 in Itasca
Jct|state=IL|I|294 in Berkeley
Jct|state=IL|I|88 in Hillside
direction_b=East
terminus_b=Jct|state=IL|I|90|I|94|road=Congress Parkway in Chicago
previous_type=I
previous_route=280
next_type=I
next_route=294
commons=category

Interstate 290 (abbreviated I-290) is a main Interstate freeway that runs west from the Chicago Loop. A portion of I-290 is officially called the Dwight D. Eisenhower Expressway. Colloquially it is known as the Eisenhower or the Ike. Before being designated the Eisenhower, the Eisenhower was called the Congress Expressway for the surface street that was located approximately in its path and into which I-290 runs at its eastern terminus in the Loop.

Interstate 290 connects Interstate 90 (Jane Addams Memorial Tollway) in Rolling Meadows with Interstates 90/94 (Kennedy Expressway / Dan Ryan Expressway) near the Loop. North of Interstate 355, the freeway is known locally as Illinois Route 53, or simply Route 53, as Illinois 53 existed before Interstate 290, but now merges with I-290 at Biesterfield Road. In total, Interstate 290 is 29.84 miles (48.02 km) in length.

Route description

Jane Addams Memorial Tollway to Veterans Memorial Tollway

This section is 7 miles (11 km) long and runs from Rolling Meadows to Addison. It is the portion of I-290 more locally known as "Route 53." Here, Interstate 290 runs largely above-grade through Schaumburg, Elk Grove Village, Illinois and at-or-below grade through Itasca and Addison.

The northern five miles (8 km) of the highway were reconstructed in 2003-2004. A left shoulder and auxiliary lane between ramps were added, as well as improved lighting. The highway is four lanes wide (not counting the auxiliary lane) north of the Elgin-O'Hare Expressway / Thorndale Avenue (mile marker 5), and five lanes wide with a wide left shoulder south to the exit to Interstate 355.

Between mile markers 0 and 4, Illinois Route 53 overlaps this section of the Eisenhower.

Eisenhower Extension

This section is 11 miles (18 km) long and runs from Addison to Hillside. It took its name when the Eisenhower was extended northwest from Hillside. The highway runs largely at-grade or above-grade for this length. U.S. Route 20 on overlaps I-290 around Elmhurst from mile markers 12 to 13, and runs parallel to the rest of this section between mile markers 7 and 18.

This section of I-290 varies in width from two lanes at the ramp east from the I-290/I-355 split, to three lanes between I-355 and U.S. Route 20, to three lanes plus two exit lanes at U.S. Route 20/Illinois Route 64 (Lake Street / North Avenue) (exit 13B). After exit 13B, the highway reverts to three thru traffic lanes. Exit 15 to southbound Interstate 294 is a frequent point of congestion due to ramp traffic backing up onto the mainline highway, often as long as 2 miles (3 km). This is because the ramp is not isolated from the mainline, only one lane in width, is a low-speed ramp (marked as a convert|35|mi/h|km/h|abbr=on ramp, and is relatively short (1/4 mile, or 1/2 km) while carrying a high volume of truck traffic south to Indiana from North Avenue. Additionally, the sudden appearance of the exit tends to cause accidents when cars in the center lane try to aggressively turn into the right lane, particularly at the mouth of the 294 exit. Finally, there is a dangerous high-volume weaving situation at the end of the ramp to I-294 with southbound I-294 traffic exiting to westbound Interstate 88. As of 2006, there are no plans to fix any of these issues.

The western three miles (5 km) of this section are blacktop, while east of Illinois Route 83 (exit 10) the original concrete is still in place.

Tri-State Tollway to Austin Boulevard

This section is 7 miles (11 km) long and runs from Hillside to the western border of Chicago. This section is commonly referred to as "The Avenues". As of 2002, it is the third-most congested stretch of highway in the Chicago area, behind the Circle Interchange area and the intersection of the Dan Ryan and the Chicago Skyway.cite web |url=http://ops.fhwa.dot.gov/congestion_report_04/chapter2.htm |title=Traffic Congestion and Reliability: Linking Solutions to Problems |date=2002 |accessdate=2007-06-14 |author=Federal Highway Administration] It is known for having a high volume of traffic on ramps through the Avenues, and high volumes of traffic on left-side ramps in Forest Park and Oak Park. Interstate 290 runs above grade west of Mannheim Road, and below grade east of Mannheim Road.

Eastbound at Mannheim Road (exit 17), the highway splits into two express and one local lane; they are joined by two onramps from Interstate 88 and form express lanes three lanes wide and local lanes to Mannheim Road two lanes wide. After Mannheim Road, the highway immediately narrows to three lanes in width, causing mile-long (1.6 km) backups. It remains three lanes to Austin Boulevard. Westbound, I-290 merely is three lanes wide to Mannheim Road, and then four lanes wide to the I-88/I-290 split. Exits at Harlem Avenue (exit 21B) and Austin Boulevard (exit 23) are left offramps and onramps, causing backups as trucks switch lanes to exit, and a large volume of traffic enters on the left side of the highway.

In 2001-2002, this section between mile markers 15 and 18 was reconstructed in an attempt to untangle the "Hillside Strangler", adding the local lanes and extra onramp to Interstate 290. The new design did not, ultimately, live up to its promise--simply pushing the "strangled" traffic eastbound three miles (5 km). Here, truck and commuter traffic from Mannheim Road and that of the Tri-State Tollway converge just before 25th Avenue to slow or stop traffic (less then 10 mph) on average from 5:45AM-10AM & 1:45PM-8:15PM Mondays thru Fridays, 9AM-8PM Saturdays and 11AM-4PM Sundays (though admittedly less than the "three-lanes-down-to-one" of the pre-2001 Hillside Strangler).

Reconstruction of mile markers 18 through 23 (1/4 mile east of Austin blvd overpass to the railroad overpass just west of 25th st) is in the planning process, but no funding for construction has been approved as of June 2007.

Austin Boulevard to Chicago Loop

The easternmost section of I-290 is 7 miles (11 km) long and runs entirely through the city of Chicago to the terminus at Interstate 90/94. It runs below grade for its entire length.

The road is four lanes wide in both directions for the entire length of the highway, and most onramps and offramps are located two blocks apart. Therefore, an exit in one direction may be marked one street (ex. Laramie Avenue), while the same exit in the other direction may be marked another (ex. Cicero Avenue), even though the streets are only a block apart. This configuration results in most exits on this portion of road being marked as A/B exits.

Eastbound congestion is lighter here than through the Avenues, generally limited to congestion on the tight onramps to the Kennedy and Dan Ryan expressways (the Circle Interchange) at the eastern terminus or a blind onramp at Kostner Avenue. Westbound, congestion is heavy starting at Laramie due to the left-hand exit at Austin (which combines a "perfect storm" of 4-down-to-three lane reduction, unfamiliar left hand exit and entrance and in-merging traffic of the central onramp). Most afternoons, this bottleneck can skyrocket the "Post Office to Wolf (Road)" commute time to over an hour (from 16 mins with no traffic).

The Eisenhower Expressway runs along blacktop for the length of the section, except between Kostner Avenue and Independence Boulevard, where it runs atop concrete.

The eastern terminus of I-290 is the Circle Interchange with I-90/I-94. After this junction, the route becomes an elevated and continues as a highway until LaSalle Street, at which point it passes under LaSalle Street Station and comes out the other side as a city street (Congress Parkway). The Congress Parkway route continues east until the street is stopped by Buckingham Fountain. [ [http://www.interstate-guide.com/i-290_il.html Interstate 290 at Interstate-Guide.com] ]

The Chicago Transit Authority maintains a rail line from the loop west to Forest Park that enters the median of the Eisenhower near Halsted Street and stays within the median through the Cicero station. After Cicero, the line leaves the median and closely parallels the Eisenhower for the rest of its route. While convenient for mass transit, it has also severely limited any possibility of lane additions to the Eisenhower where the train line is. Preliminary studies on such an effort are already starting, however. [cite web |url=http://www.eisenhowerexpressway.com/ |title=Eisenhower Expressway Reconstruction Site |author=Illinois Department of Transportation |date=2003 |accessdate=2007-01-31 Reconstruction planned for I-290 west of Chicago. Entering preliminary design as of 2005.]

History

An expressway along the alignment of the Eisenhower was foreshadowed by Daniel Burnham's plan of 1909, which described a west side boulevard. The passageway under the old Post Office was designed to preserve the right of way for the future road. [Building the Congress Expressway, http://www.cookexpressways.com/chapter11.html.]

The Expressway is named after former President and General Dwight D. Eisenhower, and was originally called the Congress Expressway (It begins on Congress Parkway). Political columnist Mike Royko joked that it is Chicago's only Republican expressway, the others all named after Democrats. The first segment, 2.5 miles (4.0 km) in length opened from Mannheim Road to 1st Avenue in December 1955. [cite web |url=http://www.cookexpressways.com/chapter2.html |date=2006 |accessdate=2006-10-02 |author=Plummer, Andy |title=The Race To Catch Up In Building An Expressway System] On December 15th, 4 additional miles (6 km) opened, from Ashland Avenue (1600 West) to Laramie Avenue (5200 West). [cite web |url=http://www.cookexpressways.com/chapter7.html |date=2006 |accessdate=2006-10-02 |author=Plummer, Andy |title=The First New Chicago Expressway]

During the 1960s and 1970s, the Eisenhower was extended to Lake Street and North Avenue. In 1963, the first working example of ramp metering took place on the Eisenhower, based on successful metering through New York City tunnels and data from ramp closures in Detroit, Michigan. The first implementation utilized a police officer at the top of an entrance ramp, stopping and releasing vehicles onto the highway at a predetermined rate.cite web |url=http:\\www.itsdocs.fhwa.dot.govJPODOCSREPTS_PR3725.pdf |title=Ramp metering status in North America: 1995 Update |date=1995 |accessdate=2008-08-16 |author=Piotrowicz, Gary and Robinson, James] Another section opened in 1972, to a north-south expressway in Addison. At the time, this expressway was a short spur from the Eisenhower Expressway and referred to as Illinois Route 53, which continued north to Schaumburg. Construction on Illinois 53 had finished in 1970.cite web |url=http://www.n9jig.com/203-up.html |title=Illinois Highways Page: Routes 203 and up |author=Carlson, Rich |date=2005-04-15 |accessdate=2007-02-01 ]

Until 1978, the Eisenhower Expressway was marked as part of Interstate 90. In 1978, the Interstate 90 designation was moved onto the Kennedy Expressway and the Northwest Tollway, replacing "Illinois Route 194". The Eisenhower Expressway was then renumbered Interstate 290.

Because the segment from Interstate 294 to Illinois 53 was built last, that portion of the highway is referred to as the Eisenhower Extension. The Eisenhower Expressway, extension included, is 23 miles (37 km) long. If the Illinois 53 portion of Interstate 290 is added to that, it is actually 30 miles (48 km) long.

In 2003-2004, the first five miles (8 km) of Interstate 290 out of Schaumburg were rebuilt, replacing pavement that had well exceeded its estimate 20 year life — the original pavement was built in stages from 1963 through 1970 as part of Illinois 53.cite web |author=Carlson, Rich |url=http://www.n9jig.com/41-60.html |title=Illinois State Highways Page: Routes 41 thru 60 |date=2006-03-15 |accessdate=2006-03-26] A fifth auxiliary lane was added between the entrance and exit ramps of exits 1, 4 and 5. The most important safety upgrade was the demolition of the raised grassy median between the westbound and eastbound lanes, and its replacement with a permanent concrete median and wide shoulders.

Lingo

The Eisenhower Expressway has subsections along its length that are used most often by traffic reporters to describe the extent of congestion on a highway. Users of the highway unfamiliar with these terms can easily be confused by them.

* Hillside Strangler — Named after the Chicago suburb of Hillside, it refers to a major merge with Interstate 88, and almost always is used when referring to inbound (eastbound) traffic. It is at this point that Interstate 88 terminates eastbound. It was called the Strangler because before its reconstruction in the early 2000s, seven through lanes were forced to merge to three, creating large backups. Urban legend suggests former Columbia College student Robert Spryszak was the first known to use the expression relating to the traffic pattern in the late 70s during the "Hillside Strangler" murders media craze. Reconstruction widened part of this area to nine lanes (5 inbound — three through, two local, and 4 through lanes outbound); allowed direct exits to Mannheim Road (U.S. Routes 12/20/45) from Interstate 88, the ramp also serving for Interstate 88 truck access to Eastbound Interstate 290; created an inbound collector-distributor ramp for Mannheim Road; and added a timed gate that closed a ramp from Roosevelt Road (Illinois Route 38) to inbound Interstate 290 during the afternoon rush. These improvements helped congestion at the site, but also pushed pre-existing congestion further east to the six lane portion of the highway. The Strangler is located at about mile marker 18.

* The Avenues — The portion of the highway between Mannheim Road at mile marker 17 and First Avenue in Maywood, a stretch of 3 miles (5 km). Named because all of the crossroads between these two exits are named numerically, in ascending order traveling outbound (westbound). 1st Avenue (Illinois Route 171) is exit 20. There are exits to 9th Avenue, 17th Avenue, and 25th Avenue to the west. These exits are spaced about 3/4ths of a mile (1200 m) apart. This stretch is notorious for being extremely congested, and is one of the higher priority projects in Chicagoland today.

* Eisenhower Extension or 290 Extension — The eight miles (12 km) of road between current-day mile marker 7 (to Lake Street/US 20) and North Avenue (Illinois Route 64), mile marker 15. This section was built in the late 1970s.

* The Circle Interchange — The eastern terminus of Interstate 290 where it meets Interstates 90 and 94, which overlap through Chicago. North of this interchange Interstates 90 and 94 are called the Kennedy Expressway, while south of it Interstates 90 and 94 are called the Dan Ryan Expressway. The interchange itself consists of eight heavily used, very tight ramps that wind around each other, giving the interchange a distinct circle shape when looked at from above. This design, adequate when first built in the 1950s, forces drivers to slow to speeds of 20 mph (32 km/h) due to its tightly wound curves, causing the worst congestion in the Chicago area. However, redesign of the interchange has been determined to be prohibitively expensive because of the small, 4 city-block area that the interchange is built upon.

* The Ike — Dwight D. Eisenhower's nick-name, 'Ike', also refers to the Eisenhower Expressway.

Post Office

Just east of the I-290 - I-90/94 Junction in downtown Chicago, the Post Office is a building that stretches over Congress Parkway. If one drives eastbound on I-290 and continues past I-90/94, the highway ends and becomes Congress Parkway. The Post Office is a landmark which is sometimes used in referring to the end of I-290 in downtown Chicago; for example, a traffic reporter might say "... forty minutes from Mannheim to the Post Office...".

The building was used by the United States Postal Service until 1996. It was bought by a developer in 1998, but as of early 2006 no progress has been made with regards to development on the site. The building itself was built from 1921 to 1933 in the Art-Deco style, and is 2.5 million square feet (230,000 m²) in size. The vast majority of the space is away from windows, and as a result has markedly less value than would be expected for a downtown structure. In spite of its unused state, the building is still known to visitors and commuters alike as the unofficial gateway into the Chicago Loop area. [cite news |author=Gallun, Alby |title=$300M revival plan for Post Office |publisher=Crain's Chicago Business |date=2005-07-01 |url=http://www.chicagobusiness.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=16994&rel=1 |accessdate=2006-01-12]

Emergency Traffic Patrol (IDOT Minutemen)

All portions of the Eisenhower Expressway between Congress Parkway & Wells and I-90 Jane Addams Tollway are patrolled by the Illinois State Police and the IDOT Emergency Traffic Patrol (IDOT ETP "Minutemen"). The ETP patrol 24/7/365 and can be recognized by their large bright yellow-green wreckers and orange jumpsuits. They can be reached at *999 via cellphone and respond to all manner of expressway incidents that you may be involved in from flat tires and no gas to major crashes. They are direct state employees and all of their services are free of charge (gasoline nominal mail-in charge). If your vehicle is disabled, attempt to pull immediately to the shoulder, place your hazard lights on and STAY IN YOUR VEHICLE until ETP arrival! If your vehicle stalls in a live lane of traffic and you are unable to coast to the shoulder, immediately place your hazard lights on, dial 911 (especially if traffic is moving at high speeds) and *999 if you have a cell phone and inform the operator that you are stalled in an interstate traffic lane; and brace for a possible high-speed rear end collision, but remain in your vehicle! An ETP vehicle wil arrive within twenty minutes (much sooner if you are in a lane). Never walk on or cross the Eisenhower Expressway on foot! Also, never accept unsolicited help from a private towing company. These companies often attempt to illegally prey on vulnerable motorists and charge exorbitant rates. If you have a motor club, call them. But DO allow the ETP driver to fix your issue or relocate your vehicle to a safe spot off the interstate. The ETP and/or state trooper can provide you with a list of reputable towing companies.

Exit list

References

External links

* [http://www.kurumi.com/roads/3di/i290.html Kurumi's 3di page — I-290]
* [http://illi-indi.com/il_EndsPage.php?id=3290&section=1 Illinois Highway Ends: Interstate 290]
* [http://www.gcmtravelstats.com/Default.aspx?selLinks1=108 Historic, Current & Average Travel Times For The Eisenhower Expressway]
* [http://www.eisenhowerexpressway.com/ Official IDOT website]