Problem Darien Intersection: County Set To Study It

DARIEN, IL — For the last couple of years, a few Darien residents have pushed for safety improvements at Cass Avenue and South Frontage Road, citing the number of accidents. Now, they are poised to see progress.

On Tuesday, the DuPage County Board is expected to vote on spending $241,000 with an engineering firm, CDM Smith, to study the intersection and the surrounding area in question.

Among CDM Smith's tasks would be to review crash data for the most recent five years. It is being asked to exclude 2020 because of the pandemic's effects on traffic.

The study is focused on Cass from Concord Place to 91st Street. It is set to review the "interaction" of Cass with interchange ramps, frontage roads, Interstate 55, and entrances to Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve and Argonne National Laboratories.

Charles Fischer is among the Darien residents concerned with Cass and South Frontage Road. This is the problem he said he has seen: Semi-trucks that exit from northbound Interstate 55 onto southbound Cass Avenue must perform three immediate lane changes across Cass to turn left on South Frontage to access the Sterling Bay warehouse.

"The law in Illinois does not allow any vehicle to make the maneuvers necessary to turn left onto South Frontage Road immediately after exiting I-55 North onto Cass Avenue South," Fischer said in a 2020 email to the county. "The unsafe weave capacity and the inadequacy of the size of the left turn lane place the public in extraordinary danger."

Fischer has said the government has been negligent with the local intersection, so it would be responsible and liable for crashes there.

Since last spring, a county traffic engineer said the county planned to study the area and make recommendations for improvements.

At least two major motorcycle crashes have occurred at Cass and South Frontage since 2020.

On May 31, 2020, Gina C. Pisano, 31, of Oak Lawn, who was riding a motorcycle, collided with a pickup truck, according to a police report. She died shortly afterward.

Last year, the Darien city government released a report that it said showed the two motorcycle crashes appeared to have been the result of poor judgment.