Coping With Construction: Palatine Road Lanes Could Open By Thanksgiving

The road construction in downtown Palatine is progressing and all new lanes of traffic are expected to be open by Thanksgiving.

Palatine Road is being widened and reconstructed from Smith Road to Kerwood Street as part of the $9.5 million project. Plum Grove Road also is being widened and rebuilt between Washington and Slade Streets.

Most of the project, about $7.7 million, is federally funded.

Although the new lanes of traffic are expected to be open by Thanksgiving, some aspects of the project–final traffic signals, decorative lighting, and final landscaping–likely will not be completed until 2011, said Matt Berry, assistant village engineer.

One complication for the project was the strike in July by the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 150 and Laborers' District Council of Chicago and Vicinity. Berry said in an e-mail response to questions about the project that the strike came during "high production periods of mid-summer," adding that the "the impact of the strike is not fully known at this time."

Still, Berry wrote that the plan is for all traffic lanes to be open by Thanksgiving.

Aside from improved traffic flow, the project is meant to make downtown Palatine safer.

Berry said that during the three-year period the project was being developed, there were 142 vehicle crashes on Palatine Road between Brockway and Benton streets.

Of those, 60 percent were rear-end crashes. Thirty-percent of the crashes were turning and angle crashes, Berry wrote that the high number of rear-end crashes could have been the result of congestion at the intersection of Palatine and Plum Grove Roads.

The project also includes new rail crossings at the intersection of Plum Grove and Palatine Roads. Hale Street will be significantly changed, as well. Hale will dead end on the north and south side of Palatine Road to improve safety and traffic flow.

"This should be a pretty nice [upgrade]," said Ashley Newton of Bollinger, Lach and Associates, a consulting firm hired for the project. "It's definitely going to improve the safety of that intersection [Plum Grove Road and Palatine Road]."

Berry said that the improvements at the intersection of Plum Grove and Palatine Roads should reduce delay times by 75 percent by improving capacity and improving signal timing after a train passes through downtown.

Click here to read more about how the Palatine Road construction is affecting businesses.