DeKALB – The city will be closing Fairview Drive west of Peace Road from Monday, Nov. 13 through Wednesday, Nov. 22.

Access to and from Peace Road will be impacted and traffic from the west end of the intersection will detour to Macom Drive.

The closure is meant to hasten the widening of Peace Road north of the Interstate 88 tollway through the Fairview Drive intersection. Work on the intersection includes resurfacing and safety upgrades and is the first stage of a larger, multi-phase project that will widen Peace Road from the tollway to the railroad overpass.

The first phase of the project cost about $3.5 million, according to DeKalb City Engineer Zachary Gill. The second phase will reconfigure and widen the intersection between Peace Road and Route 38.

“There is a concerning curve as you approach and move to the intersection, northbound particularly,” Gill said in a press release. “The second phase of the Peace Road corridor would enhance that intersection with the state highway. I would estimate that cost to be about $5-$6 million. That’s reconfiguring the angle of the entire intersection.”

The next phase would interconnect the newly widened sections.

“The third phase would be to interconnect those two now widened intersections,” Gill said. “So now the entire corridor of Peace Road from the tollway to IL-38 would have two through lanes in each direction.”

Gill estimates the third phase to cost around $3 million to $4 million.

“It’s basic work widening and adding potential turn lanes, but it’s a long stretch,” Gill said. “The tollway part of it would be a little cheaper, maybe two million to clean up a few things at the South end.”

Fixing these intersections originated from safety concerns over the many accidents and traffic build-ups associated with that stretch of highway.

“The decision was made given the deficiencies in operation and safety at Peace and Fairview,” Gill said. “If you’ve ever found yourself southbound on Peace Road while approaching Fairview, there wasn’t even a right turn lane.”

Those deficiencies contributed to traffic congestion and accidents where people quickly attempted to break in front of semi-trucks trying to make the right turn onto Fairview, said Gill.

“It was just severely undersized and underperforming, which led to serious safety concerns.”