Officials from the Illinois Department of Transportation, or IDOT, met with members of the public Wednesday evening at Shawnee Community College to discuss the potential Interstate 66 corridor.
The interstate highway would run from Interstate 55 in Missouri to Interstate 24, near Paducah.
IDOT program development engineer Carrie Nelson said the first step is to develop a purpose for the project, and determine the area’s transportation needs.
“Once we know what our purpose and need will be,” Nelson said, “we can develop alternates and evaluate them against the purpose and need and we can calculate how many acres of wetlands, how many acres of farmland will be impacted, how many people will be displaced. We’ll have a traffic model. What will be the traffic through the corridor? What will be the cost?”
With such a large area, Nelson said an overall environmental survey is needed.
“You want to map the sensitive environmental areas. The Shawnee National Forest, the Cypress Creek National Wildlife Area, any natural areas,” Nelson said. “You want to know where your known threatened and endangered species are. You have a lot of Native American sites in this project area, historic structures.”
A consulting engineering team was hired in March to begin with data collection. IDOT is collecting public input about the project, which Nelson said could cost $300 to $500 million and may take 10 to 15 years to complete.
Terri Treacy from Pope County, Illinois is against the project.
“I think we have enough highways already running through here,” Treacy said. “We already have 57 and 24 that run through southernmost Illinois. I think this is just a big boondoggle, an unneeded highway.”
She thinks the price tag is too high and the interstate would disturb the area’s unique natural areas.
“If they go right through the middle of the proposed circle, it’s the Cache Valley, the Cache wetlands. It’s wetlands of international significance. It’s backwoods. It’s where people come to hunt and fish and hike and birdwatch. People don’t want an interstate highway ruining that for them,” Treacy said.
She and other opponents to the project have formed a group called Citizens for Southernmost Illinois to fight the I-66 highway.
