January 23, 2025
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What you need to know about the Route 47 expansion around Yorkville

Project overs long-term benefits, but city officials warn of short-term ‘nightmare’ for traffic

By Joey Weslo
2012: Crews demolished the Muellner building at the southwestcorner of Route 47 and Van Emmon Street in downtown Yorkville. The adjacent wall also came down to make room for a four-lane highway. (Shaw Media file photo)

Yorkville city officials are hammering out final details with IDOT on expanding and widening Route 47 all the way to Sugar Grove. The road has been a frequent subject of recent projects as the region's increasing population has caused traffic congestion. Pictured, in 2012 crews widened Route 47 in downtown Yorkville to accommodate four lanes of traffic.

Yorkville city officials are hammering out final agreements with the Illinois Department of Transportation to widen and expand Route 47 in a project that planners say will alleviate congestion in the long-term but create traffic headaches during construction.

The project involves expanding the Route 47 corridor from Kennedy Road in Yorkville all the way to Cross Street in Sugar Grove. IDOT is involved in all parts of the project, including widening the intersections at Route 47 and Galena Road. When completed, Route 47 will be expanded, widened, have utilities moved, and have pathways and bridges more pedestrian accessible. Sugar Grove is working with IDOT on the project as well.

On the northern end of the project, Yorkville city officials are negotiating with IDOT about who is financially responsible for each part of the project. This section of the project stretches along Route 47 from Waterpark Way to Jericho Road.

“This section will take a lot of time,” said Eric Dhuse, Yorkville public works director, during the Jan. 21 public works committee meeting. “Traffic is going to be a complete nightmare for two years minimum in this area. And then if you couple that with any of the other sections, it’s just going to kind of exacerbate that and make it not a very fun place to travel.”

Yorkville city council previously approved in 2019 a memorandum covering financial and operational commitments for the project. IDOT plans to take the next big step of the bidding process in April. They recommend Yorkville come to an agreement by the end of January.

Some of the remaining issues of contention include who is responsible for maintenance along the site. The state has suggested Yorkville should be responsible for maintenance of the culvert under the future Route 47 and Baseline Road intersection. The state is also asking Yorkville to contribute to intersection improvements at Route 47 and Galena Road. City staff believe both should be IDOT’s responsibility.

“(IDOT) has corrected some issues that we had in the agreement, but there still are some unresolved points of contention,” said Bart Olson, Yorkville city administrator, during the meeting. “One is more of a debate argument as to whether we should be paying for it. The other one is probably just a factual issue that we should not be paying for it.”

Olson thinks hammering out the final agreements will take some time and hopes to have it all resolved by the Feb. 11 Yorkville City Council meeting.

City officials said while this part of the project is moving along faster than the southern part of the Route 47 project, there is still no ballpark on a construction start date.

The completed project will feature pedestrian paths along the east side all the way through the expansion. The project will also redo infrastructure along the route, like the Baseline Road bridge, which will be completely redesigned and connected to the pavement to make the intersection more pedestrian accessible.

In the northern section of the project alone, over $1 milliom of new infrastructure and water mains needs to be relocated.

Further south along the project, thousands of feet of water mains and sewers need to be improved and relocated primarily in the section from Cannonball Trail to Wrigley Way, and near Waterpark Way.

City officials have also been working with IDOT along this southern part of the project, which will widen Route 47 from Carpenter Street to Waterpark Way.

A $107,484 engineering agreement with Engineering Enterprises, Inc, was moved forward by the committee, with the intention of having IDOT reimburse the city the costs. The contract includes designing the project and overseeing the utility relocations necessary for the project in this section of Route 47.

“We know this work has to be done, and we know that we need the engineering work done on it, but we don’t have a schedule from IDOT, not do we have any memorandum of understanding or any type of agreement that says they’ll pay for it,” Dhuse said during the meeting.

City documents say that IDOT has indicated they will reimburse the city for the project costs in this section. There is no current schedule for the beginning of construction.