Palos Forest Preserves

Courtright's was a Michelin-starred restaurant in Willow Springs, in the U.S. state of Illinois.

Saganashkee Slough is a 377 acres (153 ha), manmade riparian lake that forms part of the valley of the Cal-Sag Channel. It is located in the Palos Forest Preserves of Cook County, Illinois, on wetland that was drained but was later reverted to a lake starting in 1948-1949 by the construction of dams and levees. Saganashkee Slough, like other segments of the Cal-Sag canal and valley system, drains into the Des Plaines River and ultimately into the Illinois River.

The Willowbrook Ballroom was a dance ballroom and banquet facility located in Willow Springs, Illinois along Archer Avenue. It was founded in 1921 by John Verderbar and named Oh Henry Park. The Willowbrook Ballroom is often cited as the last place Resurrection Mary danced before her death. Her ghost is said to appear at the ballroom at times, dancing with the patrons.On Friday October 28, 2016 the Ballroom was gutted by a fire. The building was having work done on the roof where the fire was suspected of starting. Due to water pressure issues the fire department had to wait on tanker trucks, which caused a delay in getting the fire under control.

Willow Springs is a station on Metra's Heritage Corridor in Willow Springs, Illinois. The station is 17.5 miles (28.2 km) away from Union Station, the northern terminus of the line. In Metra's zone-based fare system, Willow Springs is in zone D. As of 2018, Willow Springs is the 170th busiest of Metra's 236 non-downtown stations, with an average of 148 weekday boardings.The tracks run parallel to both the Illinois and Michigan Canal and the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. They also run along a former Chicago and Alton Railroad line, and shares the right-of-way with Amtrak's Lincoln Service and Texas Eagle trains, however, no Amtrak trains stop here. As of 2022, Willow Springs is served by three inbound trains in the morning and three outbound trains in the evening on weekdays only. Though Metra gives the address to the station as being at 87th Street and Archer Avenue, the actual location is along Willow Boulevard beneath the Gilbert Avenue Bridge. The current station is on the east side below this bridge. Parking is available on the west side of the bridge.

Swallow Cliff Woods is an 800-acre nature preserve located near Palos Park, Illinois, in the Palos Forest Preserves. It was built in 1930 by the Civilian Conservation Corps and operated by the Cook County Forest Preserve District. One of the highlights is a 100 foot bluff with 125 limestone stairs of varying heights. The stairs lead up to what was once a toboggan slide. Although the slide closed in 2004, the steps remain and are popular all year round for outdoor exercise; sledding is still allowed if you bring your own sled.Hikers can still enjoy over 800 acres with 8 miles of trails.

Willow Springs is a village in Cook County, Illinois, with a small portion in DuPage County. The village was founded in 1892, and was named for the springs along the Des Plaines River. Per the 2020 census, the population was 5,857.

Palos Township is one of 29 townships in Cook County, Illinois. As of the 2020 census, its population was 56,836, with its most populous municipality being Palos Hills (pop. 17,484). The vast majority of the township's population resides in its eastern half; the half west of La Grange Road consists of the Palos Forest Preserves, a section of the Cook County Forest Preserves. In 1850 the small town of Trenton, Illinois changed its name to Palos; this recommendation was made by M.S. Powell, the local postmaster, whose ancestor supposedly sailed with Christopher Columbus from Palos de la Frontera. When it incorporated as a village in 1914, Palos officially became Palos Park. Nearby communities incorporated later: Hickory Hills, in 1951, and Palos Hills, in 1958. All three municipalities lie completely or substantially within Palos Township. Palos Heights, partially in Worth Township, incorporated in 1959. Township offices are located at 10802 S. Roberts Road in Palos Hills. The municipalities of Worth and Bridgeview also lie partially in the township. Palos Township's approximate borders are Harlem Avenue (Illinois Route 43) on the east, 135th Street on the south, Will-Cook Road extended to the DuPage County line on the west, and 87th Street on the north; in the northwest, the township border follows the Des Plaines River from 87th Street to DuPage County's southeast corner. The Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, designated a National Historic District in 2011, passes through the township just south of the river, and the Cal-Sag Channel roughly bisects the township from east to west.

Illinois's 3rd congressional district includes parts of Cook County and DuPage County, and has been represented by Democrat Delia Ramirez since January 3, 2023. The district was previously represented by Marie Newman from 2021 to 2023, Dan Lipinski from 2005 to 2021, and by Lipinski's father Bill from 1983 to 2005. The district includes the western and southwestern suburbs of Chicago as far as the DuPage County border, as well as portions of the Southwest Side of the city of Chicago itself, and covers 124.5 square miles (322 km2), making it one of the 50 smallest districts in the U.S., although there are five smaller districts in Illinois. It is adjacent to the 1st district to the east and south, the 4th district to the north, and the 11th district to the west, and also borders the 6th and 7th districts at its northwestern and northeastern corners, respectively. The district was created following the 1830 census and came into being in 1833, five months before Chicago was organized as a town; it initially included northern and western Illinois before representing areas of east-central and northwestern Illinois from 1843 to 1873. The district has included part of Chicago since 1873, and part of the city's southwest side since 1895; the district has been primarily suburban since 1973.

Moraine Valley Community College is a public community college in Palos Hills, Illinois. Established in 1967, it is surrounded by the Cook County Forest Preserves. The college also operates satellite centers in Blue Island and Tinley Park, Illinois.

Site A was a research facility near Chicago where, during World War II, research on behalf of the Manhattan Project was carried out. Operated by the University of Chicago's Metallurgical Laboratory, it was the site of Chicago Pile-2, a reconstructed and enlarged version of the world's first nuclear reactor, Chicago Pile-1. The first heavy-water reactor, Chicago Pile-3, was also constructed at this site. Research was carried out under contract to the United States' Office of Scientific Research and Development. After the war, the site became the first home of Argonne National Laboratory, a federally funded research and development center. The site was returned to public use in 1956, but Site A, and a nearby site formerly used for the disposal of low-level radioactive waste, Plot M, continue to be managed by the Department of Energy's Office of Legacy Management as the Site A/Plot M Disposal Site. The Site A/Plot M Disposal Site is located within Red Gate Woods in the Palos Forest Preserves, part of the Forest Preserve District of Cook County. The site contains buried radioactive waste from contaminated building debris, and the Chicago Pile-1 (CP-1/CP-2), and Chicago Pile-3 (CP-3) nuclear reactors. "Site A" was an early Manhattan Project code for the facility. "Plot M" was the code name used for the disposal ground.

Red Gate Woods is a forest preserve section within the Palos Forest Preserve, a division of the Forest Preserve District of Cook County, Illinois. It is located near where the Cal-Sag Channel meets the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal. In the woods is the original site of Argonne National Laboratory and the Site A/Plot M Disposal Site, which contains the buried remains of Chicago Pile-1, the world's first artificial nuclear reactor. This section of the forest preserves, then code named "Argonne" (after Forest of Argonne) was leased by county commissioners to the Manhattan Project (and later Argonne Laboratory) in the 1940s and 1950s. After its initial tests, the reactor at Stagg Field at the University of Chicago was removed and reassembled at the Metallurgical Laboratory site in these woods ("Site A"). Local residents reported encountering US Army MPs guarding the area during World War II but no one was aware of the true nature of the activities until long after the war. After further experiments and the shutdown of Pile 1, by then designated Pile 2, a huge hole was dug and the 2-story high reactor was pushed into it and buried ("Plot M"). Other reactors were also built at the site and nuclear waste was buried there. The site is monitored by the United States Department of Energy and is open to the public.By the 1970s there was increased public concern about the levels of radioactivity at the site, which was used for recreation by local residents. Surveys conducted in the 1980s found strontium-90 in the soil at Plot M, trace amounts of tritium in nearby wells, and plutonium, technetium, caesium, and uranium in the area. In 1994, the United States Department of Energy and the Argonne National Laboratory yielded to public pressure and earmarked $24.7 million and $3.4 million respectively to rehabilitate the site. As part of the cleanup, 500 cubic yards (380 m3) of radioactive waste was removed and sent to the Hanford Site for disposal. By 2002, the Illinois Department of Public Health had determined that the remaining materials posed no danger to public health.There is signage in the parking lot showing Albert Einstein and Enrico Fermi at the Red Gate Woods site during the Manhattan Project. Concrete markers designate historic sites and the foundations of Manhattan Project labs still exist.

The Chicago Area Consolidation Hub (CACH) is a package sorting facility for United Parcel Service, located in the village of Hodgkins, Illinois. CACH serves as a sorting facility for packages traveling in the United States and the world. Construction began in October 1991 at the site previously occupied by the GM Truck and Bus manufacturing plant, with the CACH facility opening on March 31, 1995. The facility has an area of 48.9 acres (198,000 m2), and has a perimeter of 3.1 miles (5.0 km). It employs over 9,000 people available to work one of the four sorts, Sunrise, Day, Twilight, Night. CACH is the largest ground hub in UPS's worldwide network. Packages are only handled during loading and unloading; all sorting takes place through a system of conveyor belts and push paddles, utilizing high-speed cameras to read the destination from a smart label to sort a package to its trailer. Unlike most UPS facilities, CACH does not have Package Centers which service package cars. The facility sorts approximately 1.6 million packages per day. During November and December, volume can exceed 3 million packages per day. UPS often uses CACH for new technology testing and validation prior to deployment in other facilities. Rubus unload devices have been used in limited quantities in CACH since 2013.