More lanes under study at intersections on Lake-Cook Road

Cook County is piggy-backing on a study already being conducted by Buffalo Grove that will look at potential solutions to traffic congestion for Lake-Cook Road.

Solutions could include widening the road from four to six lanes at certain intersections.

The village had already hired Civiltech engineering, on behalf of Lake County, to study Weiland Road from Lake-Cook to Route 22. Buffalo Grove is putting up the cost for that study, but Lake County will be reimbursing it.

The Cook County Highway Department approached Buffalo Grove about using Civiltech to study other intersections on Lake-Cook Road, since traffic is always a concern on the street.

Cook County has said that the traffic signals can't be synchronized any more than they already are on Lake-Cook Road and the only way to address congestion is to improve the road capacity.

Although Cook County in the past has wanted to make Lake-Cook Road a six-lane road throughout, the county highway department is suggesting studying widening the road at certain intersections to provide turn lanes and some through lanes.

"Certainly if Cook County had come to us with a full-scale widening, I think there would be very little positive traction," Buffalo Grove trustee Jeff Berman said. "The point of the study is to bring back data that will say these things will work, these things will not. In that context, I guess there's not much to lose. We're not committing to anything."

The county is specifically interested in the intersections at Buffalo Grove Road, Weiland Road and Route 83.

Although the intersection at Arlington Heights and Lake-Cook roads has major traffic issues, that would be a separate project.

Trustee Jeff Braiman brought up extending Route 53 in a meeting with the county on Monday. The expressway portion northbound dead-ends into Lake-Cook and he said much of the traffic that travels on Lake-Cook is going to other towns.

"That's really the answer," he said.

Long Grove in the past has successfully fought proposals to extend the expressway. And representatives from the Cook County Highway Department said that even with an extension, some improvements to the Lake-Cook intersections in Buffalo Grove may still need to be made.

Cook County still has to bring forward a formal agreement on reimbursement to the village if Civiltech agrees to expand the scope of its study on Lake-Cook Road.