Need advice on driving through vs around Chicago...

I'm going to be driving from Minneapolis to Philly in a packed moving truck
towing a car in a few days and am wondering if it's more advisable to travel
through Chicago or around it. Every time I've driven through the city I get
stuck in traffic but I'm not sure if the extra time driving around the city
would be worthwhile. If our timing goes as planned we should be hitting
Chicago in the mid-late afternoon hours and it'll be on a weekday (Tuesday).
Anybody have any experience with this?

Thanks,
Nate

Have you considered the new high speed vehicle ferry from Milwaukee to
Michigan?

Nate C. wrote:

I'm going to be driving from Minneapolis to Philly in a packed moving truck
towing a car in a few days and am wondering if it's more advisable to travel
through Chicago or around it. Every time I've driven through the city I get
stuck in traffic but I'm not sure if the extra time driving around the city
would be worthwhile. If our timing goes as planned we should be hitting
Chicago in the mid-late afternoon hours and it'll be on a weekday (Tuesday).
Anybody have any experience with this?

--
"There's no such thing as Free Parking!"
Larry Gould

In article ,
"Larry Gould" wrote:

Have you considered the new high speed vehicle ferry from Milwaukee to
Michigan?

This may be the best idea of all, IF it will take your truck-car
combination.

Take it from me: driving around or through Chicago is a lose-lose
proposition. That's even true if you take I-80 east from way west of
Chicago. We got stuck in a LARGE backup heading west on I-80 a few years
ago, and east is probably no better.

"Henry" wrote in message
...
Bill Pittman wrote:

In article ,
"Larry Gould" wrote:

Have you considered the new high speed vehicle ferry from Milwaukee to
Michigan?

This may be the best idea of all, IF it will take your truck-car
combination.

I understand it's quite pricey, even for a passenger car. A truck-car
combo might be astronomical.

Take it from me: driving around or through Chicago is a lose-lose
proposition. That's even true if you take I-80 east from way west of
Chicago. We got stuck in a LARGE backup heading west on I-80 a few years
ago, and east is probably no better.

No Chicago at all. Take 80 only to the Quad Cities, then 74 to
Indianapple and 70 from there to Wheeling, with some fine-tuning once
you get to PA.


Thanks for the help guys. I'll weigh my options and see what's best.

Nate

In article ,
(Henry) wrote:

No Chicago at all. Take 80 only to the Quad Cities, then 74 to
Indianapple and 70 from there to Wheeling, with some fine-tuning once
you get to PA.

THAT might be a great way to go!

"Bill Pittman" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Henry) wrote:

No Chicago at all. Take 80 only to the Quad Cities, then 74 to
Indianapple and 70 from there to Wheeling, with some fine-tuning once
you get to PA.

THAT might be a great way to go!

It would be nice to totally avoid Chicago using that route, but according to
mapquest that combined trip is about 21 hrs, while going through Chicago
would be 18 hrs. So the only way for the longer route to be worthwhile is
if I would lose at least 3 hrs by going through Chi. I could see losing an
hour or two, but three?

Nate

"Henry" wrote in message
.. .
Nate C. wrote:

"Bill Pittman" wrote in message
...
In article ,
(Henry) wrote:

No Chicago at all. Take 80 only to the Quad Cities, then 74 to
Indianapple and 70 from there to Wheeling, with some fine-tuning
once
you get to PA.

THAT might be a great way to go!

It would be nice to totally avoid Chicago using that route, but
according to
mapquest that combined trip is about 21 hrs, while going through Chicago
would be 18 hrs. So the only way for the longer route to be worthwhile
is
if I would lose at least 3 hrs by going through Chi. I could see losing
an
hour or two, but three?

MapQuest? Try a different program, you get a different answer. According
to Route 66, it's 21 hours via Chicago and 22 1/2 the other way.

Thanks Henry. Mapquest is just my default. Is the Route 66 another map
site? My google searches come up empty.

In article ,
"Nate C." wrote:

It would be nice to totally avoid Chicago using that route, but according to
mapquest that combined trip is about 21 hrs, while going through Chicago
would be 18 hrs. So the only way for the longer route to be worthwhile is
if I would lose at least 3 hrs by going through Chi. I could see losing an
hour or two, but three?

Well, there's also the psychic agony of being stuck forever in a part of
the country you don't even want to be in. Might be worth counting on a
few more hours just to avoid that.

In article ,
"Nate C." wrote:

It would be nice to totally avoid Chicago using that route, but according to
mapquest that combined trip is about 21 hrs, while going through Chicago
would be 18 hrs. So the only way for the longer route to be worthwhile is
if I would lose at least 3 hrs by going through Chi. I could see losing an
hour or two, but three?

Well, there's also the psychic agony of being stuck forever in a part of
the country you don't even want to be in. Might be worth counting on a
few more hours just to avoid that.

Nate C. wrote:
we should be hitting
Chicago in the mid-late afternoon hours and it'll be on a weekday

Rush-hour traffic could add a half-hour to the trip through Chicago. If
that's a big problem for you, why not just time it to arrive before 3 pm
or after 6 pm? It hardly seems worth driving through Iowa to avoid.