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Illinois Closing Several Emissions-Testing Sites; Long Lines Next?

(CBS) – It's no day at the park to get that mandatory emissions test for your car. The task could get even worse.

CBS 2's Dana Kozlov reports on why finding a place to test your auto emissions will soon test your patience.

Remember last spring, how there were long lines for emission tests?

Drivers may see them again, in just a few weeks, when more than a dozen sites stop testing and others close down for good.

Independent sites, like a Car X on West Irving Park Road in Chicago, will stop doing emissions tests Oct. 14. Four of the Chicago area's permanent testing facilities, like the one on Webster in Chicago, will shut down.

Besides Webster, the Forest Preserve Drive site in Chicago, and facilities in Elk Grove Village and Tinley Park, will also close. All are casualties of state cuts.

An Illinois Environmental Protection Agency spokesperson says it's slashing, by more than half, what it's paying a contractor to run the testing program.

Trickle that down, it means no money to keep these sites operating. It also means Skokie will remain the only permanent testing site anywhere near Chicago's North Side.

The Illinois EPA spokesperson says the remaining sites will double lane capacity. She adds there will be new, independent testing sites, but those locations are still being finalized.

It's all supposed to save state government $8 million a year.

 

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