Geologic Atlas of Cook County for Planning Purposes
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Geologic Atlas of Cook County for Planning Purposes Hannes E. Leetaru Michael L. Sargent Dennis R. Kolata Illinois State Geologcial Survey 615 E. Peabody Dr Champaign, IL 61820-6964 217 333 5111 July 27, 2004 Rod R. Blagojevich, Governor Department of Natural Resources Joel Brunsvold, Director Illinois State Geological Survey William W. Shilts, Chief Table of Contents Introduction 1 Acknowledgments 3 Disclaimer 4 Index Map 5 Infrastructure Map of Interstate Highways 6 Topography Description 7 Map of surficial topography of Cook County 8 Quaternary Deposits Description 9 Thickness of Quaternary sediments 10 Bedrock Deposits Stratigraphic Column 11 Description of faulting 12 Map of faults 13 Map of the Des Plaines Disturbance 14 Silurian Description Silurian strata 15 Map of Silurian structure 16 Map of thickness of Silurian Strata 17 Maquoketa Formation Description of the Maquoketa 18 Map of Maquoketa structure 19 Map of Thickness of the Maquoketa 20 Galena and Platteville Formations Description of the Galena and Platteville 21 Map of the Galena structure 22 Map of the thickness of the Galena and Platteville 23 Ancell Formation Description of the Ancell 24 Map of the St. Peter structure 25 Map of the thickness of the top of Ancell to top of Ironton 26 Ironton-Galesville Formation Description of the Ironton-Galesville 27 Map of the Ironton structure 28 Map of the thickness of the Ironton-Galesville 39 Eau Claire Formation Description of the Eau Claire 30 Map of the Eau Claire structure 31 Map of the thickness of the Eau Claire 32 Mt. Simon Formation Description of the Mt. Simon 33 Map of the Mt. Simon structure 34 References Cited 35 Introduction The impacts of rapid urban expansion on the environment and on our ability to extract essential mineral resources require increasingly more detailed information about the bedrock geology in order to make informed planning decisions. In Cook county, the bedrock is a major source of water for residential, municipal, and industrial use. Consequently, key issues facing Cook County include the quality, quantity, distribution, and accessibility of bedrock groundwater resources. Other important bedrock issues include underground construction as well as mineral resource assessment and management. Cook County is situated on the eastern flank of the southward-plunging Wisconsin Arch. Silurian rocks thicken eastward into the Michigan Basin and the underlying Cambrian and Ordovician strata thicken southward into the Illinois Basin. The bedrock in Cook County is covered by up to 300 feet of unlithified surficial materials consisting of clay, silt, sand and gravel deposited primarily by glacial processes. Silurian dolomite is present at the bedrock surface over nearly the entire county. These rocks range in thickness from zero in small areas in the northwestern part of the county to more than 300 feet on the far eastern side along the lake shore. Silurian dolomite forms the uppermost bedrock aquifer in Cook County. The upper part of the dolomite has numerous fractures, crevices, and solution cavities which can to yield moderate amounts of water to a well. Higher yields are obtained from the more deeply buried Ordovician St. Peter Sandstone, the Cambrian Ironton-Galesville Sandstone, and the upper part of the Mt. Simon Sandstone, which is also Cambrian. Purpose The principal objective of this mapping effort was to compile a database that can be used to depict, in three dimensions, the thickness, distribution, lithologic character and structure of the major bedrock units in Cook County. The a database can be used to produce 3-D maps and cross sections of the complete 1 succession of Paleozoic rocks down to the top of the underlying Precambrian crystalline rocks. It is anticipated that the database and the maps and models produced from the database will provide important insight to subsurface conditions in Cook County. Methods Formation tops were determined for approximately 5,900 drill hole records on file at the Illinois State Geological Survey. The information was entered into a digital database and used to compile county-wide structure and thickness maps, cross sections, 3-D block diagrams, and a stratigraphic column. The data are displayed in the Lambert Conformable Projection. 2 Acknowledgments Curtis Abert, Ardith Hansel, and Barbara Stiff helped to develop this series of maps. Part of the mapping was done using Landmark Graphics software donated to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, as part of the Landmark Graphics university grant program. The manuscript benefited from comprehensive review by Robert Finley and Jonathan Goodwin. 3 Disclaimer This series of geologic maps was prepared for the purposes of resource evaluation and regional planning. The maps are based on interpretations of available data that were obtained from a variety of sources. Locations of data points have not been field-verified, nor have the data been rigorously reviewed for accuracy. The Illinois State Geological Survey does not guarantee the accuracy of the unverified data nor the interpretations based upon them. 4 WISCONS IN ARCH MICHIGAN BASIN IL IN KANKA KEE ARCH MISSISSIPPI RIVER ARCH CINCINNATII A ILLINOIS BASIN RCH 0 40mi 0 50km N OZARK DOME MO E KY LLE DOM TN NASHVI Regional geology of Illinois and significant surrounding structrual features. Cook County is colored in red. 5 94 R. 9E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. R. 12 E. T. 42 E. T. 90 T. 41 E. T. R. 9 E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. 190 290 T. 40 N. T. 4 29 T. 39 N. T. 88 T. 38 N. T. 355 90 55 94 T. 37 N. T. R. 11 E. T. 36 N. T. 80 R. 12 E. T. 35 N. T. R. 13 E R. 14 E 55 57 Interstate Highway 02 4 8 12 16 20 24 Miles Location of interstate highways in Cook County, Illinois. 6 Topography N 3-D representation of surficial topography in Cook County. Red colored areas are high and blue are low. Discussion The landforms of Cook County are mostly the result of depositional glacial processes. The significant topographic features includebroad almost level plains that were once lake beds; concentric, subparallel ridges formed as moraines marking the outer margins of continental glaciers, and gentle, elongate sandyspits, bars and beach ridges formed along the shore of glacial Lake Chicago and other ancestors of present day Lake Michigan. The highest point in Cook County is at the northwest corner and is almost 1000 feet above sea level. For most of the county the topography slopes gradually toward Lake Michigan to the east and is dissected by north-south trending stream-cut valleys. Most of the central and southeastern portion of Cook County is composed of a low flat plain. 7 R. 9E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. R. 12 E. T. 42 E. T. T. 41 E. T. R. 9 E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. T. 40 N. T. T. 39 N. T. Elevation T. 38 N. T. 950 - 1,000 900 - 950 850 - 900 37 N. T. 800 - 850 R. 11 E. 750 - 800 700 - 750 T. 36 N. T. 650 - 700 R. 12 E. 600 - 650 550 - 600 T. 35 N. T. 500 - 550 450 - 500 R. 13 E R. 14 E 421 - 450 Contour Interval: 50 ft 02 4 8 12 16 20 24 Miles Topography of Cook County 8 Quaternary Deposits N 3-D representation of the thickness of the Quaternary deposits Discussion The Quaternary age deposits are mostly the result of glacial processes but they also include post-glacial sediments. Sand and gravel used for road and building construction are recovered from some of these deposits. Locally, layers of sand and gravel in the Quaternary deposits supply residential users with good quality groundwater. The greatest risk for the groundwater resources in these areas is from surface contamination of relatively shallow aquifers. More than half of Cook County is underlain by glacial till called the Wadsworth Formation, a clay rich diamictite. The low flat plain in the east-central part of the county is mostly silt and clay of the Equality Formation. These sediments were deposited in the former glacial lake, are composed of silt and clay and, are not considered aquifers. 13 R. 9E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. R. 12 E. T. 42 E. T. Des Plaines Disturbance T. 41 E. T. R. 9 E. R. 10 E. R. 11 E. T. 40 N. T. T. 39 N. T. T. 38 N. T. T. 37 N. T. R. 11 E. T. 36 N. T. R. 12 E. T. 35 N. T. R. 13 E. R. 14 E. Contour Interval: 25 ft 02 4 8 12 16 20 24 Miles Thickness of the Quaternary deposits in Cook County, Illinois 14 Stratigraphic column showing the succession of bedrock unitsinnorthern ofbedrock thesuccession showing Illinois. column Stratigraphic Chronostratigraphic CAMBRIAN ORDOVICIAN SILURIAN SystemDEVONIAN Global ? UPPER CARADOC ASHGILL WENLOCK LUDLOW MIDDLE UPPER TOURNAISIAN LLANDOVERY Series Units ? TREMADOC GV. ARENIG LLANVIRN EF.StageFR. F. America North CAMBRIAN ORDOVICIAN SILURIAN SystemDEVONIAN MISSISSIPPIAN ? OSAGEAN ST. CROIXAN IBEXIAN MOHAWKIAN CINCINNATIAN NIAGARAN CAYUGAN ERIAN S. C. K. WHITEROCKIAN ALEXANDRIAN Series VALMEYERAN RICHMONDIAN DRESBACHIAN FRANCONIAN TREMPEALEAUAN TURINIAN CHATFIELDIAN EDENIAN MAYS. Stage Sauk Tippecanoe I Tippecanoe II Sequence Kaskaskia Maquoketa Prairie du Chien Ancell Platteville Galena - “Trenton” Muscat. Mammoth Cave Dunleith Fm0-135’ Starrs Cave Ls0-10’ Starrs Cave Ls0-200’ Burlington-Keokuk McCraney Ls0-60’ McCraney Quimbys Mill Fm 0-30’ Quimbys MillFm0-30’ Prospect HillSltst0-25’ Ft. AtkinsonLs0-60’ Ft. Brainard Sh0-100’ Brainard GroupValley Ls0-100’ Cedar New RichmondSs0-150’ New Nachusa Fm0-40’ Oneota Dol0-300’ Neda Fm0-15’ St. Peter Ss0-600’ Peter St. Decorah Fm 0-25’ Fm0-25’ Decorah Scales Sh0-135’ Shakopee Dol0-500’ Shakopee DetourFm0-180’ Grand Dubuque Fm0-40’ Dubuque Franconia Fm50-400’ Franconia Dol0-250’ Potosi Galesville Ss40-100’ Eminence Dol0-200’ Sugar RunDol0-30’ Eau ClaireFm300-750’ Wapsipinicon LsNW - 0-100’ Wise Lake Fm0-80’ Pecatonica Fm0-50’ Racine Dol0-300’ Ironton Ss50-100’ Gunter Ss0-25’ Joachim Dol0-50’ Mifflin Fm0-30’ Joliet Dol0-80’ Kankakee Dol0-50’ New Albany Fm 0-300’ Grassy Creek-Sweetland CreekShundiff.