Legal
Judlau Sues Illinois Tollway for $29.4M in Damages
Company asserts that roadway authority failed to obtain easements, adding to costs and time delays
Judlau is suing for costs it says were incurred as part of an overall effort to build the new Interstate-490 toll road on the west side of O'Hare International Airport and connect it totwo other interstates
New York City-based civil construction manager Judlau Contracting has filed a lawsuit against the Illinois Tollway Authority charging that its “pre-bid mistakes, misrepresentations and misdeeds” have caused years-long delays and soaring costs for its portions of the Interstate-490/Illinois Route 390 Tollway Interchange Project.
The contractor asserts in the lawsuit filed March 27 in DuPage County Circuit Court that it is owed $29.4 million in damages due to authority errors. A $19-million settlement was reached between Judlau and the tollway in September 2025, but only $9.6 million has been paid, and now Judlau is asking the court to rescind that agreement and allow it to recover the full amount.
At the root of the conflict, Judlau claims that the tollway didn’t obtain the required easements for two projects that are part of the overall effort to build the new Interstate 490 toll road on the west side of O'Hare International Airport and connect it to Interstate 294 and Interstate 90.
The $534-million project includes construction of three miles of I-490 Tollway mainline roadway along with 16 ramps and 15 bridges, according to the tollway authority website.
Judlau's two projects are for construction of a new Union Pacific Railroad bridge for more than $21 million and construction of a $37.8 million retaining wall from the Canadian Pacific Railway Yard in Bensenville, Ill. to Iving Park Road.
Without the necessary easements and permissions, and with project revisions, the 13-month timeline to construct the bridge turned into 777 days before Judlau could start work, the lawsuit claims.
The retaining wall project lost 514 days because the tollway's errors, the lawsuit also claims.
The tollway awarded contracts in 2021 and 2022 to Judlau for the projects with a collective value of more than $60 million, the lawsuit states.
“Unbeknownst to Judlau, the tollway’s representation to each contract were false,” according to the lawsuit. “The tollway had not secured the required approvals; Judlau was not able to access the construction sites; and the tollway repeatedly revised the plans after awarding the contracts,” leading to years-long delays and rising costs for Judlau.
After Judlau threatened a lawsuit in April 2025, the lawsuit states that the tollway agreed to make partial payments to mitigate the loss. Then in September 2025, the tollway refused to pay Judlau the final nearly $10 million due.
Judlau alleges that the tollway almost immediately sought to undermine the September agreement by directing its project manager in October 2025 to withhold almost $4 million in other pending payment requests for steel cost adjustments which it says were not part of the September 2025 agreement.
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"Adding insult to injury," the lawsuit says the tollway claimed that Judlau's documentation for the additional payment was insufficient and thus refused to pay the nearly $10 million that had already been approved by the Illinois Tollway Authority Board. Judlau says it hired an expert in construction valuation to provide a detailed assessment and a breakout of Judlau’s increased costs caused by the tollway on both projects, which it provided to the tollway in January 2026.
The tollway did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
In a separate lawsuit filed in 2024, the tollway agreed to pay nearly $31.5 million to Judlau Contracting and its trade contractors after it terminated a $324-million contact with Judlau to rebuild the southbound lanes of the Interstate 290 and Interstate 88 interchange near Oak Brook, Ill.
