Madison County anchors the northern half of the Illinois Metro-East. Its industrial spine runs from the Alton riverfront down through the Wood River refining district — Shell at Roxana, Clark at Hartford, and the Wood River tank farms and pipelines — and on to the Granite City steel works and the tank-car and fabrication plants of the American Bottom. These were asbestos-intensive operations: refinery process units, steel furnaces, and power houses reportedly used pipe covering, block insulation, refractory, and gaskets throughout, and the trades who worked them — insulators, pipefitters, boilermakers, millwrights — were allegedly exposed daily.
For claims, Madison County is served by the Third Judicial Circuit, seated in Edwardsville. It has for decades been the most active asbestos-litigation venue in the nation, and its history of handling these cases is part of why exposure that occurred in this county remains legally significant long after the plants themselves changed hands or closed.