Over at Think Progress, commenter Pale Rider (who’s apparently much more technically sophisticated than I) uses technology to arrive at pretty much the same measurement I got (about 2.6 miles) using my thumb, index finger, and squinty eye and paper maps to determine the distance from the site of Hastert’s investment property and the point where the proposed Prairie Parkway corridor would bisect Galena Road:

Funny, using the measuring tool in Google Earth, the above image maps, and the proposed interchange on Galena Road, I come up with about 2.5 miles as the crow flies.

To be honest, I don’t think it makes much a difference whether it’s 2.5 miles, the 2.6 miles I got using more primitive technology, or the 5.5 miles that Hastert’s attorney, Randall Evans, claims is the correct measurement. As a colleague at work noted, it depends where the 5.5 miles are, and these are on a country road with very few intersections–it’s not like we’re talking downtown Manhattan here.

Still, it would be nice if someone with mapping and graphic skills could superimpose the Praire Parkway corridor map onto the map showing the development property (or vice versa). If anyone out there does, post it and let me know (I’m ballison AT sunlightfoundation.com — and, of course, replace the ” AT ” with an “@” — or email it to me and I’ll post it here.

UPDATED’OH! Already done, at the link on Think Progress (this one). Okay, for extra credit — why not superimpose as well Hastert’s latest investment, 1/3 of 125.96 acres at 15715 Miller Road…