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* Rep. Buckner…
If we want to truly make IDOT an agency that embraces active transportation, we need to recruit more engineers with new age ideas & talents and move away from the 1960s old time model.
We should consider moving the District 1 HQ from Schaumburg to Chicago to help do that.
— Rep.Kam Buckner ✶ ✶ ✶ ✶ (@RepKamBuckner) June 6, 2023
The Question: Should IDOT move its District 1 HQ to Chicago? Take the poll and then explain your answer in comments, please.
posted by Isabel Miller
Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 9:59 am
Sorry, comments are closed at this time.
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Plenty of office space available downtown
Comment by Bobby Douglas Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:07 am
Kam needs to explain why moving out of Schaumburg is somehow going to change the way IDOT operates. The same engineers and managers would end up working out of Chicago rather than Schaumburg and the move would probably be expensive.
Comment by maximus Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:09 am
No, keep HQ where it is. District 1 includes Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, McHenry, and Will counties. The Schaumburg location is centrally located.
https://idot.illinois.gov/about-idot/idot-regions/index
Comment by Donnie Elgin Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:10 am
I voted yes in a “perfect world” kinda thing. Kam’s not wrong.
But does suitable office space exist at a price that we’re comfortable with the state paying? I certainly don’t know. But it’s the kind of practical thing you have to keep in mind.
Comment by Arsenal Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:10 am
No. What does moving one of 9 district headquarters have to do with transforming an agency? The Central Office is in Springfield.
Comment by Cornerfield Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:13 am
No, mostly because I don’t think it matters where the office is. You’d be surprised by how many state employees are still working remotely.
Comment by Telly Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:13 am
As a state employee, I see both sides of the “where to put agency HQs” issues. Yes you want the agency to be representative of and responsive to the needs of the entire state. But you also need to be a competitive employer. The reality is the Chicagoland area has a broader employment pool to draw from for hiring than Springfield. If you’re trying to bring in talented, experienced experts in a field, odds are a Springfield office is going to be less of a selling point than a Chicago office.
That being said, IDOT (and most DOTs) have a bigger problem: They are essentially highway agencies with misleading names. They don’t exist to improve and maintain all modes of transportation to the maximum benefit of the people they serve. They build and maintain highways.
Read any story about attempts to make roads in Chicago safer, and they are littered with references to how hard it is to get IDOT to cooperate with any sort of traffic calming or bike/pedestrial protection improvements.
Comment by Homebody Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:14 am
Schaumburg is so over-built now it is practically Chicago already. You need to change minds, not addresses. Add younger people who look like the citizens they serve.
Comment by Give Us Barabbas Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:15 am
Voted No
If you had some examples of the challenges of hiring Civil Engineers to work in Schaumburg, I might buy into this more.
Otherwise, why incur the expense and the disruption of moving these jobs into the city? I think you will have more luck recruiting civil engineers with ‘new age ideas & talents’ if you offer them the opportunity to use those skills with projects. New ideas in road construction also come with real risk (remember using the alternative material that was used to resurface part of the Ryan that started coming up right away).
Embraces active transportation, I am not sure how many IDOT scale projects can really embrace active transportation, a bike lane on the Eisenhower?
Comment by OneMan Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:16 am
Not sure how moving the office brings in more engineers and changes things from the 1960s model. I don’t see the cost benefit.
Comment by Fayette County Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:18 am
Does the State own the District 1 building in Schaumburg? How long has IDOT been at this location? I’ve googled and searched the IDOT website, but no luck. Also, the exterior looks nice, but no clue how the interior looks or has been maintained over the years.
If owned, it would not make a lot of financial sense to sell the building, then either buy or lease office space for a higher cost. However, if it’s a lease and expiring soon, the commercial real estate market could be favorable to explore re-location.
Comment by Curious George Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:21 am
===Add younger people who look like the citizens they serve. ===
Easier said than done. You first have to convince those folks to work in Schaumburg.
Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:21 am
Where IDOT is located is irrelevant.
IDOT is holding up projects everywhere. Every town is upset with them because there’s no urgency at the agency to get anything issued.
Comment by DuPage Dad Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:22 am
I voted no. Sounds about as sensible as when Blago wanted to move the office of Traffic Safety to Harrisburg.
Comment by Chicago Republican Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:25 am
Voted no primarily because I see active transportation as more of a policy issue. I don’t think engineers are holding back active transportation. It seems like we’d have the same obstacles whether we put district 1 in Chicago or kept it in Schaumburg. We might want to deal with those first.
Comment by Pundent Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:26 am
Voted yes because I am for shaking up the way IDOT operates, but the cynic in me feels like this is about patronage.
Comment by Chicagonk Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:26 am
IDOT used to have a 10th District serving just Chicago and it was located in the Marina City Office Building. Districts 1 and 10 were combined back in the 70’s (I think, a bit before my time). So this would actually be going back to the 1960s. The idea may have some merit as IDOT is a consultant heavy operation and if IDOT goes to the loop you may see more engineering firms locating in the loop. On the other hand IDOT by its nature requires a lot of vehicles and locating them in the loop is not necessarily a great idea.
Comment by What's in a name? Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:29 am
I voted yes, but I think the change would be marginal until policy makers change their own preferences. Sure, it would be nice to have IDOT engineers who actually walk places so they understand what folks outside a car have to deal with, but until the General Assembly starts directing IDOT to change their design manuals or reallocate funds towards less car-centric projects, I wouldn’t expect this to make a big change.
Comment by Chicago Urbanist Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:36 am
Voted no, for now. As indicated by the commenters, the costs and benefits are not clear.
Comment by Pot calling kettle Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:38 am
In this context, Active Transportation is often a euphemism for the war on cars. IDOT needs help and reform for sure, but maybe, just maybe, they should just get more people with common sense who can coordinate construction projects with other agencies. Or even with themselves. You screw up the Kennedy for more than a decade, finally finish the Jane Byrne project, then two months later launch a three year project on the very same expressway. Could they maybe have done some of the work at the same time so that they would inconvenience drivers at the same time? Maybe encouraging reduced volumes for the work downtown could have helped keep the traffic down on the rest of the expressway when they were doing this additional work which promises very little actual upside for people who use vehicles.
Yes, does Kam have a point on this? Sure. But how about basic competence first.
Comment by New Day Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:39 am
This is not a smart idea. It is just window dressing. Reorganizing IDOT is a better way to go, like eliminating the unnecessary regional offices and putting district engineers under real control of central office (or eliminate them altogether…no more fiefdoms). Real control by central office would allow IDOT to push an agenda statewide (such as alternative transportation), as well as require and enforce rules and laws, such as environmental concerns that get short shrift in most districts.
Comment by Jibba Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:40 am
Much of the Department, including Engineers, are working from home now up to 4 days a week. This makes a physical HQ location much less important than in the past.
Comment by Oldtimer Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:42 am
It’s not clear to me what Representative Buckner’s goal of moving the District 1 HQ to Chicago is. It’s hard to elaborate in a single tweet, and there’s no social media follow-up on the topic.
Now if it’s better access via public transit, a goal I can endorse (then again, I think a lot of places should have better mass transit access), then maybe it’s worth considering. If it’s merely “suburbs bad, city good,” then I don’t really see a benefit.
Comment by thunderspirit Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:48 am
No because I don’t see location of the office as a driver of change for IDOT’s issues. The better question to me is whether District 1 is too large and the issues too diverse to effectively manage as a single district.
Comment by Interested Bystander Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:50 am
General sentiment is yes. Every state agency should have some presence in Chicago, the state’s largest city. The fact that IDOT is in the suburbs also means that no one who works at IDOT is using any sort of public transit or biking to work which does influence how said projects viewed and are done. If you aren’t riding a bike to work, then bike lanes aren’t transportation, they are recreation.
This sentiment could change if further review of costs/benefits changes.
Comment by Nuke The Whales Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:50 am
Topic worth a discussion but Rep. Buckner needs to explain how this move would potentially advance Active transportation (bike/pedestrian), and new age ideas (more transit?, congestion pricing? safety?). How would this move change the relationship with CMAP? Seems more the policy/planning side than engineering.
Comment by Res Melius Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:53 am
I voted yes. Location of an office can shape the culture and create awareness of new ideas and different viewpoints. It is important that IDOT thinks of itself as Department of Transportation, not the Department of Highways. Being in Chicago will help (assuming it is downtown not on outskirts.)
Comment by City Guy Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:54 am
As someone who works closely with IDOT each construction season, I agree with most of the “No” comments. The Department needs what Rep. Buckner states - new engineers with new ideas. I’ll add that it also needs more of everything but money - it has plenty of that.
Every Resident Engineer in the field mentions understaffing while all of us on projects have to deal with layers of administration resulting in delayed decision-making, payment, and project completion. It’s only going to get worse with all of the federal funding that’s coming on top of the previous influx of state cash. From concept to design to implementation - the whole process is in need of improvement.
Trying to move a bureaucracy while it’s in the midst of all of this seems misguided, time-consuming, and expensive.
Comment by Lefty Lefty Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:54 am
There could be some newly available space right by the Metra stop in Arlington Heights for a gleaming new IDOT building
Comment by Lucky Pierre Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 10:59 am
One new idea, apparently, to embrace is that everything has to be in Chicago or else it doesn’t matter. That mentality has bad effects for the state.
Comment by Torco Sign Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:02 am
yes. transportation to Schaumburg is ridiculous. we are trying to encourage more mass transit use, and biking. have you tried getting there to go to Ikea? make the location more transit friendly.
Comment by amalia Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:04 am
IDOT has a satellite office at 900 S Des Plaines, which it has had since the Dan Ryan rebuilds started in the 1980’s. The bigger challenge is keeping the institutional memory, after two rounds of early retirement buyouts in 1991 and 2001. It’s crazy to pay a retiree a pension, then pay the same retiree as a consultant at 2.7 times their direct cost - but there has to be a will to rebuild, else IDOT will go the way of the City of Chicago and the Tollway, which have minimal staff, and consulting engineers doing almost all of the work.
Comment by Ares Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:06 am
===There could be some newly available space right by the Metra stop in Arlington Heights for a gleaming new IDOT building===
1) Illinois is not going to bail out the billionaire Bears. They own it, should be lots of folks willing to buy it,
2) I thought the Bears wanted to be there, why would they sell, where will they go, they still don’t have 60/30 and they have governor calling any deal a “bailout” not a deal.
3) Using IDOT as snarky leverage is a tell, the Bears have no leverage so mockingly saying that means they made bad choices, and snark has truth, the Bears need a bailout help out of this mess.
To the QOTD?
The cost/benefit should be about what will get done, not “what could” be done.
Show the menu of projects of Chicago, funded and scheduled, then decide… so stay in the meantime
Comment by Oswego Willy Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:10 am
I voted a LOL No.
It’s pretty much exactly where it should be now.
Comment by The Truth Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:16 am
IDOT District 1 has a total of 28,934 miles under its control.
Only 3,859 of which are in the City of Chicago.
Suburban Cook=8,585
Collar Counties=16,490
Comment by Mr. Math Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:17 am
OW, you get that LP was joking, right? I mean I give him as much grief as anyone but cmon. It was a joke.
Comment by New Day Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:18 am
I voted a qualified yes. It makes sense if it is a piece of a conscious shift in culture/approach. Having an office in Chicago that focuses on innovation and building a culture to support that would be great. Just changing addresses for some staff won’t get it done.
Comment by Montrose Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:18 am
- New Day -
I read your comment.
Comment by Oswego Willy Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:21 am
I like the Rep’s idea but with a tweak. Keep the Schaumburg office. Open a new one.
IDOT has 5 Regions and 9 Districts. Each Region has 2 districts except for Region 1. Region 1 covers Will, Cook, DuPage, Kane, Lake, and McHenry County.
It would seem like a good idea to open a “D0″ or “D10″ office in Southern Cook County based on the map.
https://idot.illinois.gov/about-idot/idot-regions/index
Comment by Tweed Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:31 am
Floor leaders gonna floor leader.
Comment by Dirty Red Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:31 am
I voted yes because I live in the city and more jobs in the city is a good thing.
Comment by ChicagoVinny Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:42 am
No. Moving the office does nothing. The talk about hiring engineers with “new age ideas” without the money to pay them is so much hot air. Given the choice of working downtown Chicago and Schaumburg, would pick the burbs any day of the week.
Right now, the traffic engineering field is about as incestuous as it can get. All of the consulting firms are chasing the same people. People are job hopping from one company to another.
Given the hiring difficulties, IDOT can’t compete. Crappy salaries, extremely long duration between application, interview, job offer, and hiring. There is no incentive for any civil engineer to work for IDOT.
It used to be that IDOT was the nursery for highway engineers. People worked there long enough to get their PE license and then go work for a consultant. Now IDOT reposts positions multiple times just to get a single interview.
Comment by Huh? Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:49 am
I voted no, because if the engineers are mostly working from home it really doesn’t mattecr much.
But New Day, the war on cars is mostly not real. It’s just that pedestrians and bikes and buses want their space, too. And logically, that space is going to have to partially come from existing driving surface. I mean traffic accidents are big killers, it might be good to reduce those. Getting some folks out of their cars secure in the fact that it won’t be a death sentence as pedestrians and bikers might not be a bad idea.
Comment by cermak_rd Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:49 am
=== Now IDOT reposts positions multiple times just to get a single interview===
OK, so without endorsing Buckner’s idea, maybe a rethink is in order?
Comment by Rich Miller Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 11:54 am
Voted no. Sounds like promoting movement as progress.
Comment by AlfondoGonz Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:03 pm
I voted yes because like Nuke, seeing is believing. Downtown Chicago has lots of pedestrians, bikers and mass transit.
In my experience, most young engineers get it. But young engineers aren’t in charge. By the time they are in charge, they’re old and have adopted the worldview of their predecessors. I think IDOT is so calcified that change will have to come from outside the agency (Governor Pritzger?).
They already have a policy of “complete streets,” but they only pay it lip service.
Comment by Sir Reel Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:05 pm
“rethink is in order”
Get CMS out of the hiring process. Pay much higher salaries. Drastically shorten the time it takes to hire a new employee.
Comment by Huh? Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:05 pm
Move it into the city but near O’Hare along the Kennedy at Cumberland, make everybody and/or nobody happy
Comment by 48th Ward Heel Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:10 pm
I voted yes. Chicago is home to universities and agencies that specialize in urban planning, transportation and logistics, including UIC, IIT and CMAP (Chicago Metropolitan Agency for Planning). Having IDOT here in Chicago, with these resources, could be a great plus.
Comment by Valerie F. Leonard Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:12 pm
Voted no. Hiring and retention is not really a function of location. If you looked at the landscape of competition for hiring, Rosemont and the rest of the suburbs have just as many Civil Engineering slots as the City does. Salary, benefits and opportunities are as much a factor as the location of the office. In a job where getting to the work sites is such a factor, parking a fleet downtown for transportation of staff is not ideal. Within IDOT, the pay, the need to rotate through Springfield for true career growth, the public perception of public pension systems is a huge factor.
Comment by NotSoCivlEngineer Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:12 pm
Depends on what you really want?
Sounds like a great way for the City progressive brokers to grab more government jobs and reward their people. Guessing not many people will reverse move into the city from the suburbs.
You have a pretty sizable motor pool and daily field workers. Are you going to move those people to the city as well? Where will you get the same size space for the motor pool? Plus Schaumburg is centrally located for all the area it covers.
Good to know Kam is shilling for Active Alliance.
Makes sense that an agency that deals with only 15% of its projects in the city should now move in to the city rather than stay central to where the other 85% are.
Comment by Frida's Boss Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 12:49 pm
I voted no. There are many that work there who need access to cars to go out and do their field work - traffic counters, bridge inspectors just off the top of my head. It needs to be centrally located within the district. and fun fact, its really Hoffman Estates, but they somehow have a Schaumburg address. trust me - that I how got tricked into working out there in the early 90’s. I lasted a year out there and headed back to 310 S Michigan.
Comment by PMS Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 1:01 pm
I think what Rep. Buckner is getting at is that people with “new age” ideas about active transportation tend to be younger, and younger people tend to want to live in the city rather than a suburb.
Comment by Thicc Offerman Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 1:11 pm
Voted no.
Moving a building to change the way people think is Bailey logic: Move the capital back to Vandalia because the farther south you go, the more Opposite people think.
Or somesuch nonsense.
Comment by Streator Curmudgeon Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 1:22 pm
I voted no for two reasons. For 1, how does the location of 1 of 9 offices change an Agency? For 2, aren’t we reading about 10+ different stories of the corruption and lack of ethics of Chicago politicians? Moving toward that seems inane.
Comment by Lurker Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 1:32 pm
I have no problem bringing new ideas to IDOT, but how is moving headquarters to Chicago going to change that? Also, how much would it cost?
Comment by G'Kar Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 2:25 pm
Sounds like a great way for the City progressive brokers to grab more government jobs and reward their people.
I think you nailed it.
Comment by The Truth Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 2:48 pm
===Does the State own the District 1 building in Schaumburg? How long has IDOT been at this location?===
The State does own the building and the adjacent Materials Lab next door. The lab is newer (early 2000’s). The HQ building was built in 1980s (I think). When D10 (Chicago) and D1 (Schaumburg) combined they moved to a leased space near Woodfield mall. Then it was a “few” years later that they built the building they are in now.
To the post… I voted “No”. The bigger issue is IDOT is need of an overhaul, or reorganization. There is still too much silo work going on and not much adjustment to newer design and operations strategies. The act of physically moving buildings may be an opportunity to reflect on business processes. However those business changes need serious discussion before any physical move is contemplated. And while the ideas out of D1 have fallen behind of many other states, it’s not just a D1 problem anymore. Reflection and adjustment is necessary statewide and it needs energetic leadership from a number of staff.
Comment by From DaZoo Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 4:06 pm
Yes.
IDOT does not serve the interests of Chicagoans who use modes of transportation other than cars. They only serve automobile users with the goal of moving vehicles as vast as possible. This is anathema to city life and it degrades the quality of city neighborhoods.
Having engineers that do not drive, or who have the option of not driving, would help IDOT serve Chicagoans more effectively. The 1960s mindset of building more, bigger highways, only leads to worsening outcomes for people who live in cities. The department of transportation should take into account the high numbers of people who walk, roll, and take public transit to get around when they design and build streets in the City. This requires engineers to get out of their cars.
===Active Transportation is often a euphemism for the war on cars=== Active Transportation is about giving people options for mobility. Requiring people to purchase and maintain expensive vehicles to get around a city that was originally built for pedestrians, is asinine. No one is coming to take anyone’s car away. It is long time though, to take some of the city back from automobiles and invest in other modes of transportation.
Comment by South Sider Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 4:28 pm
I voted yes and have been voting yes on this issue for years. Walk and use the facilities that you constantly constrain city agencies to do anything remotely friendly to all users. However, DuPage Dad, there is no sense of urgency. If they would have moved when Daley was in they may have gotten one. Now I don’t know of a single agency with an urgency to do infrastructure better.
Comment by DMC Tuesday, Jun 6, 23 @ 4:32 pm
IDOT has a myriad of internal issues but headquarters location isn’t one of them.
Comment by Bridge Builder Wednesday, Jun 7, 23 @ 7:47 am