I wrote about this Thanksgiving week and didn’t get around to plugging it here. You might also have read it in the Marshalltown Times-Republican, North Tama Telegraph, AND Tama-Toledo News-Chronicle. (I get paid in exposure, unless you’re one of my paid Substack subscribers, which, please?)
But, since it’s still so important: Highway 30 is four lanes between Ogden and Lisbon now! I don’t have to keep getting stuck between semis going to and from Des Moines!
A pretty much expected decision happened last month. After spending multiple cycles as the smallest public school in Iowa by BEDS numbers playing 11-man football, North Tama will drop to 8 going forward. (Story: North Tama Telegraph.) About half of the opponents NT has played over the past 30 years have made the same decision. The biggest historical opponent losses will be Grundy Center and Hudson. AGWSR and BCLUW are also on that list for now, but both could drop in this cycle or the next.
(Fun fact, according to Cyclone Fanatic: Through the end of this year, North Tama is the last team to have beaten Grundy Center in the regular season… in 2019.)
The change will be big. I have no idea how or if Dennis Field itself will be changed, because 8-man games are played in a smaller space.
I would support changing the definition of 8-player to Class B football in Iowa, resurrecting a long-gone categorization in a different way. That would also free up the opportunity to split into Class 1B and Class 2B, should the number of teams participating be enough to do so.
While NT may be parting from nearly all its former North Iowa Cedar League opponents of the 1930s-80s, enough schools between US 20 and I-80 are playing 8, including Gladbrook-Reinbeck, GMG, and Belle Plaine, that future districts could be relatively compact. (And… ugh… Don Bosco, who could drop 70 on us as a welcome present. Bleah.)
It’s not IA 5 anymore, but Army Post Road remains an important arterial on Des Moines’ south side. This week the Des Moines City Council approved $3 million for the city’s third roundabout, which will be at East Army Post Road and SE 36th Street. Stories: KCCI, KCCI from October, KCCI from June 2023, Axios.
Presently, this is a rural intersection. It is not the former intersection with IA 46, as that road now dead-ends in both directions from Army Post. For a long time, this intersection was on Des Moines’ east city limits, but an annexation about 20 years ago extended control all the way to US 65. (Technically, the right-of-way of US 65.)
Construction is expected to finish in 2026.
By beating Kansas State, Iowa State football did one of the most important things it’s never done. Tomorrow it has a chance to do another — win an outright conference championship.
This is extremely late to the party but can’t go unnoticed.
A roundabout is planned for the intersection of US 63 and Business US 30 in Toledo. A meeting was held in October about it and was covered by KCRG and the Marshalltown Times-Republican. (Here’s a correction for the T-R: The term is “right-in, right-out”, not “ride in, ride out”.)
“I don’t see how we’re going to gain anything by putting your marry-go-round [sic] down there,” Jim Kupka of Clutier told KCRG.
It’s understandable that the city of Toledo doesn’t want to deal with continuing to maintain the stoplights, which have been hanging by a diagonal string over the intersection since they were put up. If that’s the main concern, and now that the rest of 63 through Tama-Toledo has been three-laned, maybe the solution is simply — ugh — a four-way stop.
The deadline for feedback has passed, but we all know what the answer is: No matter how many people hate it, it’s coming next year.
It will be the first roundabout in Tama County.
Clarion-Goldfield-Dows has cancelled its varsity girls’ basketball season. Not enough students are interested. Story: KCCI via KCRG.
“The [IGHSAU] knows the number of girls playing basketball is going down, but does not know why,” KCCI’s Marcus McIntosh said in the story.
This is about enrollment. This is about decline in interest in extracurricular activities, across the board, for years. And if not those, I can explain it in two words: Travel volleyball.
Given that I recently wrote about Goldfield’s school coming down and its once-rich basketball tradition, a story like this should be treated as a warning.
The eastbound I-80 to northbound I-35 flyover ramp opened last Thursday — just in time for Thanksgiving traffic, of course. This shuts down the left exit that was original to the mixmaster. The exit point is now much farther west, closer to the US 69 (NE 14th Street) exit, and is now a right-hand exit to a ramp that then forks between I-35 north (left) and I-235 west (right).
April 13, 2016: This view of the connection from Second Street to IA 149 shows a two-ramp set. The ramp from 149 to Second, where the bicyclist is, would be removed under a proposed plan.
On the Iowa DOT’s information site is an upcoming project that focuses on IA 149/Business US 63, formerly US 63, in downtown Ottumwa just north of the viaduct. The plans were put out last month.
This section of highway was built in the 1950s. Heading north from downtown, there was a mini-median, not full width, but grass-covered until a few decades ago. At the time of original construction, former IA 23 ran north from downtown but did not have a direct connection. An offramp from southbound 63 to northbound 23 was built, as was a ramp from both one-way directions of IA 23 (Main and Second) via Kitterman Avenue (see above).
The proposal (PDFs here) eliminates the off-ramp from 149 down to Second Street. My guess is that that connection would be considered covered by the stoplight at Fourth Street since there is a connection between Fourth and Second just to the east. The next intersection, Fifth Street, is where 149 angles northwest. A driver could turn “right”, which was actually straight ahead, onto Wapello Street, although Google Street View from this year shows that may be closed now. There would be a new intersection with Fifth (to the west) and Wapello (to the north) that, based on the lack of left-turn lanes in the diagram, may be a right-in-right-out scenario in which no traffic can turn left. Also, the proposal diagram shows Fifth as a two-way street, which it currently is not.
(Sorry for the lack of posts. I’m currently deep into a research project and also recovering from the election.)
I wrote about Monday’s ceremony in the Veterans Memorial Building downtown honoring members of Cedar Rapids metro veterans organizations.
Storm Lake Pilot Tribune, May 9, 1979:
County buys new computer / At cost of $93,000
Buena Vista county has purchased a new computer for the courthouse at a net cost of over $93,000. The board of supervisors voted Tuesday to buy a Burroughs B 800 computer for installation in late August or the first part of September.
Cost of the basic computer and accessories is $91,112, but the county will get a government discount and trade-in allowance on its current computer for $18,000, leaving a new cost of $73,112. “Software” items and training will boost the cost to $77,252. In addition, various programs will increase the cost another $16,300, putting total cost at $93,552.
Curt Brown, Storm Lake, territory manager for Burroughs, said the basic difference between the B 800 and the county’s existing Burroughs computer is all information is stored on a disc rather than on punch cards. The new unit is capable of storing more information and operates at greater speed.
The B 800 will be operated by video terminal display units, similar to a television screen. The terminals can be set up in different offices, and the basic cost includes six such terminals. Plans are to locate terminals in the offices of assessor, auditor, treasurer, recorder and engineer.
The Rhode Island Computer Museum calls the B 800 computer an “unusual piece from a largely forgotten manufacturer.” Five figures of “software” items and it couldn’t even drive a turtle.
