Live cameras in Darien, United States

Darien is a quiet residential city in DuPage County, about twenty miles southwest of downtown Chicago. Its whole southern edge borders Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve, a large loop of woods, oak savanna and prairie wrapped around Argonne National Laboratory, with a trail that passes the small Rocky Glen waterfall. The town was settled in the 1830s by New Englanders who came west through the Erie Canal and the Great Lakes. It only incorporated in 1969, and the name was borrowed from Darien, Connecticut, after the founding committee could not agree on anything else. Roughly 22,000 people lived here at the 2020 census.

Darien sits just north of Interstate 55, the Stevenson Expressway, which follows the path of old Route 66 here. Interstate 355 runs a few miles to the west and the Tri-State Tollway, I-294, lies a short distance east, so the area is a crossroads of commuter traffic heading toward Chicago, O'Hare and the southwest suburbs.

About the cameras

The cameras grouped under Darien belong to the Illinois Department of Transportation's Gateway system, published through Travel Midwest. They are snapshots taken every few minutes from poles above expressways and interchanges in this part of DuPage County and its neighbors. You will mostly see lanes, ramps and shoulders, which makes them a fair way to judge congestion, crashes or snow cover before setting out.

• Weekday rush hours bring the heaviest traffic toward the city in the morning and back out in the evening.
• Winter storms can coat the pavement quickly; the images help show whether plows have been through.
• Summer weekends often bring steady traffic toward the forest preserves and Route 66 attractions.

Darien keeps Central Time. In late June the light lasts until about half past eight in the evening, while in December it is dark before five. Fog sometimes settles over the low ground near the Des Plaines River valley on calm autumn mornings.

For a change of scene on the map, Argonne and Waterfall Glen sit immediately south, and neighboring Willowbrook keeps a bit of Route 66 history alive at the old Dell Rhea's Chicken Basket roadhouse.

Sources: Darien, Illinois - Wikipedia · Waterfall Glen Forest Preserve - Forest Preserve District of DuPage County · Travel Midwest (Illinois DOT Gateway).