Explore authentic prairie along The First Hundred Miles of Route 66

The Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie supervisor’s office and welcome center re-opened Tuesday, according to an announcement from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service.

This announcement comes following a closure for extensive maintenance to the building’s heating, ventilation and air conditioning system that began Dec. 9, 2024.

“We are excited the maintenance is complete and we can re-open the supervisor’s office and welcome center,” Christina Henderson, Midewin NTP’s prairie supervisor, said in a news release. “We sincerely appreciate everyone’s patience during this extremely important maintenance period. We will now be able to offer a better experience to all those visitors during the cold of winter and the hot days of summer.”

The Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie is one of the most striking natural spaces you’ll find along The First Hundred Miles, and the entirety of Route 66. Dubbed “The Largest Prairie Restoration Site East of the Mississippi River,” the prairie preserve encompasses over 20,000 acres. The park is managed by the U.S. Forest Service and recognized as a U.S. National Grassland.

Bison were reintroduced on the prairie in October 2015, making this gorgeous plot even more authentic. While it’s not guaranteed, every visit offers the opportunity to potentially spot these elusive animals as they roam throughout the preserve from the park’s publicly accessible viewpoints and trails. It takes most people approximately 90 minutes to hike in and back from the Iron Bridge Trailhead to the spotting scopes located along the Route 53 Trail (southwest overlook) and the Group 63 Trail.

The goal of the preserve is to restore and manage tallgrass prairie vegetation, remove unnecessary legacy infrastructure and eliminate invasive woody vegetation. The surrounding landscape is vulnerable to exurban and suburban development, so the preserve serves as a means to help ease the impact of land lost to development and increase an already ecologically important grassland ecosystem.

The Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie is the largest island in the archipelago of protected areas that collectively comprise the Chicago Wilderness. These parks include Goose Lake Prairie (home to the largest native tallgrass prairie remnant in Illinois) and Des Plaines Conservation Area (which provides 2,000 acres of additional grassland habitat). Today, volunteers and staff are working with over 275 species of native Illinois prairie plants. Midewin is second only to Newton’s Prairie Ridge State Natural Area in the number of nesting area-sensitive grassland bird species in Illinois.

A desire to increase the population numbers and improve the habitat for grassland birds was one of the key instigators that led to the prairie restoration at Midewin. While touring the site in 1982, biologists with the Illinois Department of Natural Resources noticed that near the Route 66 side of the park, there were previously unheard-of numbers of the rare upland sandpipers. Inspired and filled with hope for the future of the arsenal site as a potential haven for upland sandpipers and more, the park began to take shape.

Once a landscape dominated by rusting factories and abandoned bunkers of the former Joliet Army Ammunition Plant, this sprawling 20,283-acre pristine tallgrass prairie is a compelling vision for landscape-scale restoration. Visit fs.usda.gov/midewin and follow facebook.com/Midewin for information and maps.

Check out Midewin’s convenient mobile app at midewin.stqry.app for a free self-guided tour.

The Midewin National Tallgrass Prairie supervisor’s office and welcome center is open from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. Monday through Saturday.