Fox River Trail in Elgin to get multimillion-dollar repair

Poplar Creek isn't so popular among fans of the Fox River Trail segment that runs through the Raymond Street Forest Preserve near Elgin.

For more than three years, the creek has been an obstacle for runners, bikers and hikers. But a $2.3 million solution is on the way.

Kane County Forest Preserve District commissioners gave preliminary approval Friday for $136,000 of engineering work to fix a problem that started in 2008.

Flooding that year, and again in 2013, damaged a bicycle bridge that ran under the Union Pacific Railroad tracks. The damage was so severe the bridge was removed.

The cost to fix it has been a hindrance ever since. Without the bridge, users of the trail have had to come up onto Raymond Street and compete with traffic to cross the creek.

The forest district recently secured a $1.8 million grant to help with the cost of a project to allow trail users to cross the creek by once again going under the railroad tracks. A steel casing pipe, 12 feet in inside diameter, will be bored and jacked under the railroad. Trail users will then be able to run, hike and bike through the pipe to the other side.

Forest district staff members say they believe they can budget for the remaining cost of the work.

If the project remains on schedule, construction for the pipe will begin in September 2017.

The 43.5-mile Fox River Trail runs primarily north-south along the Fox River for the entire length of Kane County and beyond.

Commissioner Becky Gillam said the broken portion of the trail has been a sore spot and safety concern for her constituents for too long.

"To get this amount of money for what was an unexpected trail disconnection is huge," Gillam said.

"If we had to come up with this amount of money on our own, we'd be canceling other projects everywhere in the district. And this isn't something we just want to do; we have to do it," Gillam said.