{"id":426,"date":"2017-12-23T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-23T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/choose.maclyn-dev.com\/2017\/12\/23\/ohare-western-access-is-road-to-opportunity\/"},"modified":"2020-11-24T22:05:46","modified_gmt":"2020-11-24T22:05:46","slug":"ohare-western-access-is-road-to-opportunity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.choosedupage.com\/ohare-western-access-is-road-to-opportunity\/","title":{"rendered":"O&#8217;Hare Western Access is Road to Opportunity"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span style=\"color: #5e8ab4;\">Letter to the Editor of the Daily Herald, by John A. Carpenter, President &amp; CEO of Choose DuPage<\/span><\/h2>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">There have been a number of stories written over the past few years regarding the progress of the<\/span>\u00a0<a title=\"Western Access O'Hare\" href=\"..\/..\/western-access-ohare\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Western Access O&#8217;Hare<\/a> <span style=\"color: #58595b;\">project. Local media has recently questioned if the new I-390 Tollway will ever lead somewhere. It appears people have short memories. The new I-390 Tollway is part of the Western Access effort that will eventually connect to O&#8217;Hare creating a western access point to the airport &#8212; a project vital to our region, and especially DuPage County.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Key components of the O&#8217;Hare Modernization Project (OMP), agreed to and approved 15 years ago, were predicated upon the successful completion of the Elgin-O&#8217;Hare Tollway, I-390. The project began with an addition of nearly 50 expressway lane miles. By converting Thorndale Avenue into a limited-access, four-lane highway, we&#8217;ve created an extension to the Elgin-O&#8217;Hare Expressway, opening the opportunity to build a bypass that connects I-90 and I-294.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">This is an incredibly important project, not only for DuPage County, but for residents and businesses across the Chicagoland region as whole. The benefits from the Western Access O&#8217;Hare project are compelling. As a component of the larger OMP, this effort will completely transform the economy of the region.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">As a quick reminder, according to the Elgin-O&#8217;Hare Western Bypass Advisory Council, the economic benefits of this project include:<\/span><\/p>\r\n<ul>\r\n\t<li><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Creation of 65,000 jobs by 2040<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t<li><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Local tax revenues expected to increase by $29M annually (based on 2010 projection)<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t<li><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">13,450 jobs will be created annually in the region during construction<\/span><\/li>\r\n\t<li><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Travel delays will be reduced, saving an estimated $145 million annually by 2040<\/span><\/li>\r\n<\/ul>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Today, the manufacturing, transportation and warehousing industries have a workforce of 75,000 in DuPage County, nearly 15 percent of our entire labor force. The Western Access O&#8217;Hare project is vital to the future of our region if we are to sustain this level of economic activity. Despite the uncertainty that both public-and private-sector organizations face in today&#8217;s environment, Choose DuPage continues to work toward expanding the regional economy through actions that stimulate business investment in our region and generate desirable job opportunities for residents.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">In a market where industrial vacancy rates have been on a nearly continuous five-year decline, our county is finding new ways to remain competitive. Industrial businesses are making their move to DuPage, and Western Access to O&#8217;Hare allows for further growth; this is truly a road to opportunity, crucial to the future of our economy.<\/span><\/p>\r\n<p><span style=\"color: #58595b;\">Since 2014, Choose DuPage has worked with the Illinois Tollway and regional public- and private-sector leaders to establish the Western Access O&#8217;Hare corridor as a premier global business location. This project will relieve congestion in the western suburbs and generate a raft of jobs and economic growth\u2014with or without a new O&#8217;Hare western terminal. DuPage deserves this and the region will benefit from it. So, I challenge the notion I-390 is a road to nowhere. Meaningful western access is building a road to opportunity that is crucial to the future of our economy.<\/span><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There have been a number of stories written over the past few years regarding the progress of the\u00a0Western Access O&#8217;Hare project. Local media has recently questioned if the new I-390 Tollway will ever lead somewhere. It appears people have short memories. The new I-390 Tollway is part of the Western Access effort that will eventually connect to O&#8217;Hare creating a western access point to the airport &#8212; a project vital to our region, and especially DuPage County.","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1680,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,36],"tags":[],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v22.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>O&#039;Hare Western Access is Road to Opportunity - Choose DuPage<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"The new I-390 Tollway is part of the Western Access effort that will eventually connect to O\u2019Hare creating a western access point to the airport \u2014 a project vital to our region, and especially DuPage County.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.choosedupage.com\/ohare-western-access-is-road-to-opportunity\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"O&#039;Hare Western Access is Road to Opportunity - 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