South Dakota to Illinois Car Shipping Guides

Moving to Illinois

• More carriers pass through here than anywhere else on the continent

  The regional planning agency puts roughly 25% of all US freight trains and 50% of all intermodal trains through metropolitan Chicago, with some facilities handling over 30,000 trucks a day. For a car shipment the consequence is supply: a carrier heading almost anywhere in the country is already passing nearby, so pickup windows out of Chicago are among the shortest you will be quoted. It is one of the few places where asking for a specific week is realistic.

• The same density is what makes a driver late

  Trucks are about one in seven vehicles on Illinois urban interstates, and the interchanges where I-90, I-94, I-55 and I-80 meet are among the most congested freight bottlenecks in the country. A driver who misses his window through the city does not make that time back on the next leg. Morning collections are easier to hold to than afternoon ones, and a suburban meeting point off the expressway is often quicker than a door deep inside the city.

• Ninety-two of the state's worst weather events were storms

  NOAA counts 128 billion-dollar weather disasters in Illinois between 1980 and 2024, of which 92 were severe storms and only 12 winter storms. The five years to 2024 averaged 7.8 such events a year against a long-run average of 2.8. Winter gets the attention here, but the record says spring and summer storm lines are what actually interrupt a shipment most often.