The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Floating down LaSalle Street

For five whole days of the past seven, I saw sunlight. Not a little; I saw tons of it. There were rumors of clouds, but mostly, just sunlight.

Since I returned home Tuesday night we've not had any. Instead, we've had this:

Storm totals in just the last 14 hours have gotten up to 125 mm in places, flooding highways and making life a wet hell:

The first expressway closures occurred around 5 a.m. The Edens Expressway was closed between Foster and Touhy avenues and between Winnetka and Willow roads, and the Eisenhower Expressway was shut down in both directions between North Avenue and York Road and westbound at Mannheim Road, Illinois State Police said. The southbound Kennedy Expressway was closed at Addison Street, police said.

As of 9:30 a.m., the Kennedy was open in both directions, though some standing water remained. The Edens was closed in both directions between Lake Street and Dundee Road in the north suburbs, and the northbound Edens was closed at Montrose; the westbound ramp from Interstate 290 to Interstate 88 was shut down, westbound 290 was closed at St. Charles Road, and eastbound 290 was closed at York Road; two lanes were closed on the Bishop Ford northbound between 130th Street and the Beaubien Woods.

Travel times during the morning rush ran at least two hours or longer in some areas.

For my part, both last night and this morning I misjudged approaching squall lines and got a bit damp. Parker, for his part, missed them both completely.

It seems the rain has moved off to the east now as a warm front pushes up through the area. (It's 10°C at O'Hare but 19°C in Valparaiso, 70 km southeast.) The warm front will depart the area later today, just to keep variety going, dragging more rain and cold back through overnight.

We may get drier, warmer weather someday. Someday.

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