Wednesday, January 25, 2006
Ken Arnold on Regional Development: Quad-State National Defense Causeway
The Quad-State National Defense Causeway Act
BACKGROUND AND PROBLEM
Since the 1800’s, Lake Michigan’s cutting down into the Mid Atlantic region of our country has been a boon for mariners but a bane to all land travelers. It has been too wide and too long to do much of anything in terms of non-boat transportation.
Because of the above situation, travel has been two to seven times longer than if one would be able to make a straight line across Lake Michigan. This fact has been an inconvenience at best – and a great inefficiency in our country at worst.
But as time has gone on, the problem has grown exponentially. The “natural bottleneck” at the south tip of Lake Michigan for all forms of land transportation (i.e. rail, auto, and truck) has become a nightmare. Road congestion has greatly increased the hazards of travel – and such congestion can make even PRIOR, long travel times double or more from what they even were before. At this point in time, one can never be assured of estimating travel times around the southern points. It’s always a gamble depending upon traffic accidents, downtown Chicago events happening, and other factors that either pop up or the traveler was unaware of at the start of their journey.
All of the above problems are cause enough to energetically seek better alternatives. But now we have one more, extremely important one: The threat of Terrorist Attack.
Terrorists can easily use the natural bottleneck of the southern Lake Michigan tip to tie up, and immobilize, the entire Great Lakes region. Because so many of the major east/west highways and rail lines understandably pass just a few miles away from one another at the southern most point, a carefully located biological or nuclear bomb could effectively cut off all the major east/west regional travel routes in the area. There would be no way to then traverse except many miles around Chicago – greatly increasing the already horrendous travel times and further crippling things since the same traffic would have to be funneled on fewer and smaller roads.
Yes…terrorists would find that our Mid-Atlantic/Chicagoland area would be the EASIEST region to paralyze traffic of anywhere in the United States.
ANALYSIS AND SOLUTION
We need not allow ourselves to be laid so vulnerable. And we need not also allow our economy to languish with the utter inefficiencies we live with today with the “natural bottleneck” Lake Michigan has posed to us for the past two centuries. We can build a solution.
This solution is a cross-lake causeway that would come to be known as the Quad-State National Defense Causeway. This causeway would be a combination of several linkages.
1) Two Passenger/Freight Rail Lines
2) A four lane highway (that would later be expanded to eight)
3) High tension electric lines
4) Natural gas line
All of the above would be along this causeway’s route. The natural gas line and two freight/passenger lines would be located in the center with two lanes on each side of that (expanded later to four lanes on each side via having pylons that were planned for such expansion).
This causeway would be patterned after the Chesapeake Bay Causeway as well as the Key West Highway 1 already in existence. It would, closely paralleling the technology/ideas of the Chesapeake Bay project, have several man made islands, tunnels, and overhead bridges which would allow for reasonable maritime navigation of North and South Lake Michigan to continue unabated and minimize terrorist threats to this new public work.
Four potential routes could be considered. It is here envisioned by the creator of this idea that perhaps of the four studied routes below, Option 2 would be implemented now. Later, a longer and more northerly causeway could also be constructed. But going this route would involve lesser expense and still yield great benefits. The writer did not pick the very shortest route for reasons later specified within this paper. And, depending upon project cost and fund availability at that time, the longer route suggested for later development would be Option # 4. These options, with their direct distances to traverse, are as follows:
Option Starts Ends Causeway Length
1
Around Burnside, IL and the intersection of Routes 41 and 12 south of Chicago Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
35 miles
2
North Side of Evanston, IL
Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
48 miles
3
North Side of Waukegan, Illinois Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
68 miles
4
North Side of Waukegan,
Illinois
Benton Harbor, Michigan
72 miles
ADVANTAGES OF THIS CAUSEWAY PROJECT
The author does not simply specify the benefits of this project to be in the jobs created and the boost from the project itself that it gives to the area economy; he points to the ongoing transportation efficiencies in time and money that the entire Mid-Atlantic region will garner. This surely justifies this project several times over. The Quad State Causeway is one of those grand, public works that people will wonder why it took so long to even conceive.
Much in the way of time and money will be saved. Pipeline transporters will get natural gas to Detroit, and major Canadian cities (and perhaps FROM Canada as well). Railroads such as Canadian Pacific Railroad who traverse the bottleneck every day adding many hours and miles to their travels will also benefit. And truckers and private citizens who sit in traffic for hours on end looping around the lake (a task that has come to almost preclude doing so in a weekend’s venture) will also greatly benefit both economically and in their quality of life by this project.
But the benefits don’t stop there. There is a dire need, as earlier described, to end this natural bottleneck for our very own security – and perhaps our very lives. As mentioned, should nuclear or biological attack occur that cuts off the rail and highways that traverse thru this relatively narrow area, routes of evacuation from an entire area could be cut off? In the Chicago area, land travel evacuation – by definition – can only be by going North, South, or West. East is an entirely precluded escape direction because of Lake Michigan. But with a causeway, such an evacuation could take place. With a causeway, the vital transportation routes need not even be completely severed if a terrorist attack would occur. This route would be a physically and geographically separate route and provide a backup to any such calamity.
Even the route closest to downtown Chicago, and lowest cost to build (i.e. Option 1) lies 15 miles from downtown Chicago. Any central city nuclear blast would not affect it since a radius of 10 miles is where the most damage occurs in such nuclear explosion. However: this option was only second in choice because of two items (in order of importance): a) Prevailing northwest wind would likely contaminate the area while not destroying the structures; and, b) A more northerly starting point, while being a longer/more costly causeway, would eliminate nuclear/biological fallout concerns and provide even greater economic efficiencies from saved time and travel resources most affected by the bottleneck (i.e. more northern residents).
CONCLUSION
The Quad-State National Defense Causeway is a vital economic -- and national security project -- whose time has come. The technology is there…the concept is used successfully elsewhere in areas such as Key West Florida and the Chesapeake Bay area. And these other already completed projects are in depths much greater than the 60 to 200 feet deep waters we’re talking about here. Lastly, proper installation of such a causeway will not materially affect maritime shipping or our environment.
For our economy, our quality of life, for our very lives – this is an idea whose time has come.
To return to McHenry County Blog, click here.
BACKGROUND AND PROBLEM
Since the 1800’s, Lake Michigan’s cutting down into the Mid Atlantic region of our country has been a boon for mariners but a bane to all land travelers. It has been too wide and too long to do much of anything in terms of non-boat transportation.
Because of the above situation, travel has been two to seven times longer than if one would be able to make a straight line across Lake Michigan. This fact has been an inconvenience at best – and a great inefficiency in our country at worst.
But as time has gone on, the problem has grown exponentially. The “natural bottleneck” at the south tip of Lake Michigan for all forms of land transportation (i.e. rail, auto, and truck) has become a nightmare. Road congestion has greatly increased the hazards of travel – and such congestion can make even PRIOR, long travel times double or more from what they even were before. At this point in time, one can never be assured of estimating travel times around the southern points. It’s always a gamble depending upon traffic accidents, downtown Chicago events happening, and other factors that either pop up or the traveler was unaware of at the start of their journey.
All of the above problems are cause enough to energetically seek better alternatives. But now we have one more, extremely important one: The threat of Terrorist Attack.
Terrorists can easily use the natural bottleneck of the southern Lake Michigan tip to tie up, and immobilize, the entire Great Lakes region. Because so many of the major east/west highways and rail lines understandably pass just a few miles away from one another at the southern most point, a carefully located biological or nuclear bomb could effectively cut off all the major east/west regional travel routes in the area. There would be no way to then traverse except many miles around Chicago – greatly increasing the already horrendous travel times and further crippling things since the same traffic would have to be funneled on fewer and smaller roads.
Yes…terrorists would find that our Mid-Atlantic/Chicagoland area would be the EASIEST region to paralyze traffic of anywhere in the United States.
ANALYSIS AND SOLUTION
We need not allow ourselves to be laid so vulnerable. And we need not also allow our economy to languish with the utter inefficiencies we live with today with the “natural bottleneck” Lake Michigan has posed to us for the past two centuries. We can build a solution.
This solution is a cross-lake causeway that would come to be known as the Quad-State National Defense Causeway. This causeway would be a combination of several linkages.
1) Two Passenger/Freight Rail Lines
2) A four lane highway (that would later be expanded to eight)
3) High tension electric lines
4) Natural gas line
All of the above would be along this causeway’s route. The natural gas line and two freight/passenger lines would be located in the center with two lanes on each side of that (expanded later to four lanes on each side via having pylons that were planned for such expansion).
This causeway would be patterned after the Chesapeake Bay Causeway as well as the Key West Highway 1 already in existence. It would, closely paralleling the technology/ideas of the Chesapeake Bay project, have several man made islands, tunnels, and overhead bridges which would allow for reasonable maritime navigation of North and South Lake Michigan to continue unabated and minimize terrorist threats to this new public work.
Four potential routes could be considered. It is here envisioned by the creator of this idea that perhaps of the four studied routes below, Option 2 would be implemented now. Later, a longer and more northerly causeway could also be constructed. But going this route would involve lesser expense and still yield great benefits. The writer did not pick the very shortest route for reasons later specified within this paper. And, depending upon project cost and fund availability at that time, the longer route suggested for later development would be Option # 4. These options, with their direct distances to traverse, are as follows:
Option Starts Ends Causeway Length
1
Around Burnside, IL and the intersection of Routes 41 and 12 south of Chicago Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
35 miles
2
North Side of Evanston, IL
Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
48 miles
3
North Side of Waukegan, Illinois Between Michigan City, Indiana and Beverly Shores, Indiana
68 miles
4
North Side of Waukegan,
Illinois
Benton Harbor, Michigan
72 miles
ADVANTAGES OF THIS CAUSEWAY PROJECT
The author does not simply specify the benefits of this project to be in the jobs created and the boost from the project itself that it gives to the area economy; he points to the ongoing transportation efficiencies in time and money that the entire Mid-Atlantic region will garner. This surely justifies this project several times over. The Quad State Causeway is one of those grand, public works that people will wonder why it took so long to even conceive.
Much in the way of time and money will be saved. Pipeline transporters will get natural gas to Detroit, and major Canadian cities (and perhaps FROM Canada as well). Railroads such as Canadian Pacific Railroad who traverse the bottleneck every day adding many hours and miles to their travels will also benefit. And truckers and private citizens who sit in traffic for hours on end looping around the lake (a task that has come to almost preclude doing so in a weekend’s venture) will also greatly benefit both economically and in their quality of life by this project.
But the benefits don’t stop there. There is a dire need, as earlier described, to end this natural bottleneck for our very own security – and perhaps our very lives. As mentioned, should nuclear or biological attack occur that cuts off the rail and highways that traverse thru this relatively narrow area, routes of evacuation from an entire area could be cut off? In the Chicago area, land travel evacuation – by definition – can only be by going North, South, or West. East is an entirely precluded escape direction because of Lake Michigan. But with a causeway, such an evacuation could take place. With a causeway, the vital transportation routes need not even be completely severed if a terrorist attack would occur. This route would be a physically and geographically separate route and provide a backup to any such calamity.
Even the route closest to downtown Chicago, and lowest cost to build (i.e. Option 1) lies 15 miles from downtown Chicago. Any central city nuclear blast would not affect it since a radius of 10 miles is where the most damage occurs in such nuclear explosion. However: this option was only second in choice because of two items (in order of importance): a) Prevailing northwest wind would likely contaminate the area while not destroying the structures; and, b) A more northerly starting point, while being a longer/more costly causeway, would eliminate nuclear/biological fallout concerns and provide even greater economic efficiencies from saved time and travel resources most affected by the bottleneck (i.e. more northern residents).
CONCLUSION
The Quad-State National Defense Causeway is a vital economic -- and national security project -- whose time has come. The technology is there…the concept is used successfully elsewhere in areas such as Key West Florida and the Chesapeake Bay area. And these other already completed projects are in depths much greater than the 60 to 200 feet deep waters we’re talking about here. Lastly, proper installation of such a causeway will not materially affect maritime shipping or our environment.
For our economy, our quality of life, for our very lives – this is an idea whose time has come.
To return to McHenry County Blog, click here.
# posted by Cal Skinner : 9:01 AM
