^ Usually it helps to post a Gmaps link. Are you talking about something near Wolf Rd or Mt Prospect Rd?

Wild guess though would be that it's a data center (very common in this area) or else clearance for the western access highway, assuming you're talking about something large enough to post here about.

Former A.M. Castle Metals site? A typical, run-of-the-mill precast industrial building. I believe that the ROW for the future I-490 will be just west of this site, so this work doesn't have anything to do with the West Bypass. Here's the link:

New industrial building coming to 27-acre site in Franklin Park

http://www.chicagotribune.com/suburb...119-story.html

Also the south leg of the O'Hare Bypass (IL-390) is on hold due to obstructionism from Canadian Pacific RR.

I believe the Tollway will re-focus work on the north leg connecting the Elgin-O'Hare to I-90 around Elmhurst Road.

^ Is the south leg or north leg going to be called IL 390?

^^ Is there actually something planned to become Interstate 490 or did you mean Interstate 390 (which would presumably just be an upgraded designation for IL 390) ?

SR 390 is the designation for the existing Elgin-O'Hare tollway and the in-progress extension along Thorndale Ave. to York Rd., which will be its eastern terminus on the west side of O'Hare.

Interstate 490 will be the designation of the O'Hare West Bypass from the Jane Addams all the way down to the Tri-State.

Obviously it remains to be seen if the southern leg of the bypass will be built at all, since the Canadian Pacific RR is pitching a bitch about air/land rights for the structure that would inevitably be built above the existing rail yards south of Irving Park Rd.

They just want more money. That is one messed up yard, or atleast it used to be 10 years ago when I knew someone who worked there. Some of the stuff they pulled I cannot believe. Got to love the CPRR.

By the way, I saw one of the new AA 787-9's at ORD this week so now UA and AA have operated -9's at ORD.

It's not quite that simple. 490 would go under the yard on a short underpass (at left), but it would also run at-grade for about a mile on land north of Green St. This would basically take out all of CP's staging area to the south of the yard, outlined in magenta. I don't think they can raise the highway up over the staging area because of the Runway Protection Zone for 10R-28L, and CP doesn't want to give up their staging area. Probably they're just holding out so the government will pay the cost of setting up another staging area somewhere else.

http://i65.tinypic.com/2w7llr7.jpg

That looks like a nightmare (cost-wise, execution-wise) for what would effectively just be an access ramp. Because of that, airport access to/from the southern reaches of I-294 seems far more suited to its current configuration, maybe with some capacity improvements.

The north leg in contrast is a piece of cake, especially with the tollway oasis now cleared off.

The question is whether either of the north or south leg projects will get going so long as there is a significant possibility that future terminals will be built as satellites of the main terminal campus, i.e. without adding any western access. (In that case, the nearly-finished IL 390 would serve as a feeder into Irving Park Road for roundabout access to the terminals via Mannheim and, for T5, via the new Balmoral bridge.)

When did Vigin stop flying LHR - ORD? Or is that like a seasonal thing? Seems odd they would kill their direct flight from London to the town with their first Virgin Hotel.

Yes, it will be suspended for the winter seasonal, but they will be back for next Spring 2017.

Unfortunately, the finances for the project were modeled assuming the total package of improvements.

I don't know if the project will generate enough toll revenue if the south leg is deleted, even though the overall costs would go down.

It would also make the Elgin-O'Hare into a spur of I-90, pushing more traffic onto that highway.

No. Virgin Atlantic has pulled the plug completely. AA/UA/BA are just too strong on the route and they have no feed since they are SkyTeam. Still, it's pretty sad they couldn't even maintain a single daily flight. The widely held belief is that management decided the plane/resources could just be better allocated elsewhere and it wasn't worth keeping the Chicago route for vanity purposes. There will still be a minimum of 8 daily flights between the two cities

Many SkyTeam carriers have a hard time competing at ORD. Air France can't even maintain a year around flight.

Hmm. I didn't realize it was going to be at grade for that entire length.

But you are right in saying that the clearance wouldn't be there for runway 10R-28L to build a bridge structure above the yard that far west.

I honestly don't remember if I meant to say above or below, but I do remember these two alternatives being presented some time ago. Unfortunately any of the presented alternatives would have meant more private land being acquiesced from Bensenville, which the village was none too happy about.

The only other option I could possibly think of is to continue tunneling below the yard out toward County Line Rd., but I'm certain that would balloon the budget, not to mention a new set of feasibility/environmental/engineering studies would need to be done.

This seems like as good a reason as any for Chicago to have a second international airport. What is the driving factor for the monopolization of O'Hare by certain giant carriers? Is it economies of scale? Is O'Hare a more expensive place to have gates? Is it just lack of connecting flights if you aren't using O'Hare as a hub?

If it's cost related it seems almost like a no brainer for Chicago to open up another international airport to allow some smaller international hubs to set up shop here.

All the above. That's why they need more terminals. The big 2 have taken all the available gates and don't want to give them up. Poor planning by Skyteam and Delta did not help as Delta pretty much pulled out of ORD pulling down operations back in the late 1980's. The L-side terminal used to be full of Delta widebody's and DC8 stretches and Northwest used to have daily 747 and DC10 flights. Now they are mainly regional. That's maybe why Delta has expressed interest in coming back to ORD in a larger way, the Skyteam partners want Chicago to be viable...No duh!!!

^ O'Hare is in the midst of a multi-billion dollar reconfiguration, and the City needs the carriers to approve high ticket fees to fund the work. In return, the city gave UA and AA a near-monopoly, at least on certain corridors...

The last thing Chicago needs is a new airport, which would be yonder practically in Kankakee (unless Wolf Lake?). Air infrastructure efforts should be poured into making ORD better and better, including its downtown access. That all would feed back into securing downtown as the best place to locate offices and workers.

ORD is the only airport with 2 competing carrier megahubs, so I think we're still doing pretty well even if SkyTeam has a tiny presence. But by all means if the funding is there (and UA+AA resistance can be overcome), a concourse for SkyTeam would be great. I wonder what routes Delta would try to nourish here. When it comes to international routes, for example, UA and AA do require passengers to change on the east coast for many Europe destinations, so that might be one opportunity for DL/SkyTeam.

Yea but the major airfield work is nearly complete. 9C/27C is under construction so all that really remains is to eventually lengthen 9R/27L which doesn't have to be done immediately. Agreeing to phased improvements has bought the airlines decades of limited competition even if the city did have to waive the western terminal at them a couple times to get them to come along.

Now everybody wants more gates, even AA/UA. Sprit, Frontier, Alaska/Virgin have all expressed interest. It's even possible Southwest could show up at the table since Midway can't accommodate many more flights (though the larger 737 MAX planes will help) and a lot of their arguments for not serving it no longer apply.

A handful of gates are being built right now and the city is in discussion with UA and AA on a long term vision for the airport. I expect to hear something within the next 6 or so months about what will essentially be OMP 2. Another $5+ billion expansion but this time it will be passenger facilities, not runways. O'Hare passenger numbers are up up up and that means more $$$ to go around.

Yea, they pretty much need to have an agreement hammered out next year since a bunch of gate leases are coming up in 2018. AA is spending some money to get the rest of the E175s out of the H/K side where they are sucking up gates that could be used for larger planes.