Driving from MKE to ORD
 

Yesterday I left downtown Milwaukee at about 3:30pm and drove the first 65 miles on my way to ORD in about 70-75 minutes. I was cruising down I-94 without any traffic. I then hit I-294 and it took me about 45-50 minutes to go the last 13 miles to ORD. This surprised me, as I figured the traffic would be heading North, away from Chicago, rather than towards Chicago, but northbound traffic was non-existant. Luckily, I had plenty of time to catch my flight (which was subsequently delayed 3 hours).

I am going to be doing this each week for the forseeable future, at about the same time as well on Thursdays, and I am wondering if there are any alternatives to I-294 to ORD. When looking at the Hertz map, it looked like there were some other roads that would do the trick. They may be side roads, but they can't be any slower than I-294.

Any route alternatives anybody could provide would be greatly appreciated.

Hi SMF UA 1K! I hope some other Chicagoans can offer you some suggestions. (I live and work in the city, so I can't.) Chicago commuting has evolved over the past couple decades. The time it takes to do the reverse commute (out of the city to the burbs in the a.m., burbs to city in the p.m.) has actually grown, so it now takes longer to do a reverse commute than a traditional commute. You obviously experienced that first hand.

I've never seen more screwed up traffic in my life since I moved to IL some years ago. Sometimes it seems as though ALL the roads are torn up ALL the time. Perhaps this had some bearing on your problem.

They built the Empire State Building from scratch in 9 months 70 years ago, but it takes years to finish some short stretch of road in IL. There's a simple exit ramp onto 294 near my house that will take an entire year to complete. It's utterly inane.

And, of course, 11 of the 12 guys on the road crew are all standing around looking at the one guy actually doing something.

If I ever get insane enough to run for IL political office, I know what my platform will be.

Another possibility springs to mind. Often, driving near Chicago, there will be a huge backup for no reason. You crawl along for 20 minutes, then all of a sudden, traffic breaks free and you are going 60 again. No accident, no road construction, nothing at the site of the delay. Just a bottleneck for no reason.

I don't recall this phenomenon in other states I've lived in, at least nowhere near as often as it happens here.

Get used to it....welcome to Chicago! ^

When I'm driving around, I listen to WBBM radio 780 am and if traffic is bad on the road that I am on, I take an alternative.

You could go west over to I-90 before you get to I-294 and approach ORD from the north, but I am not certain that would be any better. Best thing to do is plan your trip so that you can avoid rush hour.

Steve

I oftentimes visit MKE and fly into ORD. Have you considered taking the shuttle to and from the airport? It costs $40 RT and gets you there to the door in about 1.5 hours. Just a suggestion but I like having somebody else doing the driving :)

Why don't you just fly into MKE and never have to worry about Chicago traffic?

We have two seasons, winter and road construction.
It's the slinky effect (like how a slinky compresses and expands). There is an explaination on the Straight Dope site.

To answer the OP's question, the alternate routes are not that great. A lot of the traffic stems from a bottleneck which was created when they redid the I-90/94 split in the city a number of years ago. They messed up the southbound flow on 94 to improve the northbound flow. This makes I-94 (the Edens Expressway) a real mess during the reverse commute, and means that more people take I-294.

The alternatve isn't great - unless you are a native and can handle the risk of getting lost on side streets, there's only really one decent alternative - get off at either Willow or Golf, go west to US 45 and go south to US 12 south, then don't get back on 190 but take the back way into the airport rental car facility by turning right at the first stop light after IL 72. This approach will take you through downtown Des Plaines. I don't think you'd save any real time, but it might be less frustrating.

If you're daring, you might try Golf Road east to Potter south to Busse east to Dee south to Devon west to River south to 190 west into the airport. Smaller streets, less truck traffic, but probably worse traffic signalization.

Drive was MUCH better yesterday
 

I was wondering if someone would raise this and thought about addressing it in my OP. Even though it's not relevant to my question, there are two main reasons why I don't fly into MKE. First, I need to be in Milwaukee as early as possible on Mondays. If I land in ORD at noon, I am usually where I need to be around 2:00 or 2:15. If I were to fly into MKE, the earliest I could arrive would be at 1:35. After getting my bags, rental car, and something to eat, I'm probably at the office at the same time. I don't have to worry about potentially missing a connection by flying the non-stop to ORD.

The second reason I don't fly into MKE is that if I were to connect through DEN, I'd have to fly on an RJ and I detest them, so I'm not going to fly 900 miles on then once or twice each week if I can avoid it. It would be a shorter ride through ORD, but connecting through ORD can be a crapshoot, especially when I am on the last flight of the day back to SMF.

Anyway, my ride down I-294 was much better yesterday. I hit it at the same time as last week, and it probably took half the time it took the previous week. Just before crossing the state line into Illinois on I-94, there is a sign showing times to certain destinations. Last week, it showed 80 minutes to ORD, which I thought was crazy when I saw it, but as soon as I hit the traffic, I knew it was right. Yesterday showed 51 minutes, which was much better.

So, thanks to all for the alternate routes. I may take them one of these days if the traffic is just too much to bear. Unfortunately, there's not much I can do about the time I get there (I'll be leaving Milwaukee at 3:30 each Thursday, so I'll probably be just getting to I-294 around 4:45-5:00), so I'll just have to hope that yesterday was normal and the previous week was an aberration.

Just wait 'til it rains! The very threat of a shower will slow Chicago traffic to a standstill. Never seen anything like it.

One minor thing to consider on 294 southbound to ORD is that there are no exits past Golf Rd. (route 58). There are, however, onramps for several exits past there.

As a result, the right lane often moves slower because of the additional "load" past there. Not a hard-and-fast rule, but something to watch out for.

Glad to hear your drive went better the second time. Like most others, I can't suggest a really promising alternate route. Hopefully things won't get too much worse once construction starts this summer.

I am a Milwaukee native, and I too must now deal with Chicago traffic. Years ago, Midwest had a nonstop from SFO to MKE. Ah, those were the days. Now, it's a Southwest nonstop from OAK to MDW and a drive north. As much hassle as that is, it beats an RJ connection in that lovely terminal E/F of ORD.

We on the South Side are dreading the Dan Ryan (I-80/94) construction, which will hamstring us for many months. Starts tomorrow.