Looks like Continuing Bad News for McHenry County’s Route 53 Commuters

The opponents of Extending Route 53 to Route 176 won a victory at the Lake County Board, the Daily Herald reports.

So McHenry County comuters who use Rt. 53 will continue to be frustrated.

The original plan by the Illinois Department of Transportation was to hook up Rt. 53 with Rt. 176.

The eastern route would go to Waukegan.

The western route would run between McHenry and Johnsburg, up to Richmond to the Wisconsin Interstate.

That was originally planned around 1970 to service a racetrack in Richmpond run by Marge Everett.

She figured with interstates running from the Chicago area, Madison and Milwaukee, such a facility would be successful.

The problem was that the residents of the Long Grove area were influential enough to put a brick on the project.

It appears they still are.

While McHenry County Republican Party Chairman Al Jourdan had enough pull to get Route 176 widened to four lanes from McHenry into Lake County, he couldn’t overcome Lake Countu opposition.

With no support from McHenry County legislators (myself included), Jourdan did convince the Illinois General Assembly to turn over IDOT righmt-of-way to the Toll Highway Authority.

There was no compensation rendered to the Road Fund.

The Tollway has done nothing to fulfill Jourdan’s dreams of a four-lane Interstae to his homerown of Johnsburg.

Opponents of the extension argue that just improving existing roads will be good enough.


Comments

Looks like Continuing Bad News for McHenry County’s Route 53 Commuters — 9 Comments

  1. The compassionate conservative, fiscally responsible tax payer in me must ask whether this project is really necessary. Therefore, I give the impression I know what I am talking about while opposing roads and infrastructure expansion at all costs. Tic, tock, tic, tock, tic, tock, meeeeeeoooooooowwwwwwwwwwww…

  2. Ridiculous. Illinois is probably the most backward State in terms of planning roads needed in the future and then building them. The Route 53 freeway extension to the WISC border should have been planned and then built about 50 years ago.

  3. Where was our Sociology and Political Science professor 50 years ago. Stay tuned…tic, tock, tic, tock, tic, tock, meeeeeeoooooooowwwwwwwwwwww…

  4. If you are referring to me, I never taught sociology.

    Never even took a course in the subject.

  5. I moved to Illinois in 1984 and the day I got here the headline in that day’s Daily Herald was about a possible Route 53 extension into Lake County.

    I guess if it has been thwarted for 35 years, it can wait another 35.

    It should have been done 50 years ago, but I guess I’ll never see it in my lifetime!

  6. Get rid of illegal aliens in Illinois and say goodbye to traffic jams.

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