Illinois Highway Builders Keep Massive Job On Track
Utilizing streamlining methods, contractor feedback and exhaustive research, the Illinois Tollway authority is well under way with a $5.3-billion, 10-year overhaul and expansion of much of its 274-mile system. Now almost halfway through, the program so far is on time and on budget, with less than 5% in change orders and no major claims, officials say.
“We’re are trying to complete 80% of all construction in the first five years,” says Jeffrey Dailey, the tollway’s chief engineer. The overhaul, developed in 2004 as an initiative of Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich (D), includes a $327-million conversion of 20 mainline toll plazas into open-road tolling and a $730-million, 12.5-mile extension of Interstate 355 south to I-80. “We went from a capital budget of $100 million a year for maintenance to $1 billion a year in improvements and reconstruction,” says Dailey.