Tuesday night is going to have a rarity for highway construction plans nowadays, a formal meeting. An “updated preliminary design” for the US 61 Wapello bypass comes six years after the initial proposal. It includes a huge change. The new design has a full interchange south of Wapello, northeast of the 65th Street\/K Avenue intersection.<\/p>\n
If this isn’t the first time that a city has succeeded in getting the state to change its four-lane plans in a big way, it’s one of a very few. The 2018 plan<\/a> involved only one point of access to Wapello, the G62 exit. Residents and emergency services hated it. Then in 2019 the DOT offered a half-interchange slip ramp<\/a> at the south end. Residents and emergency services still hated it. In 2020 the DOT offered a J-turn<\/a> at the south end. The J-turn concept\u00a0became so toxic<\/a> in the 2010s that the Iowa DOT rebranded it as a “restricted crossing U-turn intersection.” That’s the name applied when the first one opened in Iowa<\/a> southeast of Fort Dodge on US 20. (It wouldn’t have been needed if the new gas station there had opened up a mile to the west at the Coalville exit. Alas.)<\/p>\n But now \u2014 again, six years<\/em> after the preliminary-but-ideally-final plan was released and Wapello raised holy hell \u2014 it very much looks like the city will get everything it wanted, even a Business 61 route.<\/p>\n In May 2021 I said<\/a> that Thanksgiving 2030 would be a realistic possibility for completion of the four-lane US 61. As of now, the five-year plan has paving of the Wapello bypass in fiscal year 2029 (late 2028-early 2029). I may have a horn to toot later.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Tuesday night is going to have a rarity for highway construction plans nowadays, a formal meeting. An “updated preliminary design” for the US 61 Wapello bypass comes six years after the initial proposal. It includes a huge change. The new … Continue reading