{"id":7936,"date":"2016-09-21T10:00:37","date_gmt":"2016-09-21T15:00:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/?p=7936"},"modified":"2016-09-18T11:47:26","modified_gmt":"2016-09-18T16:47:26","slug":"old-ia-394-st-francisville-bridge-closes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/2016\/09\/old-ia-394-st-francisville-bridge-closes\/","title":{"rendered":"Old IA 394 St. Francisville bridge closes"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"IF\"
\nJuly 12, 2016:<\/strong> The St. Francisville bridge over the Des Moines River.<\/em><\/p>\n

Well, it finally happened: A dozen years after it was bypassed, the old bridge over the Des Moines River in Lee County has been closed permanently. It was only a matter of time; I was kind of surprised when it didn’t close shortly after the opening of the new Avenue of the Saints bridge just to its west or upon completion of the four-lane road.\u00a0The website nemonews.net has the story<\/a> (h\/t Austin Draude) and reports that the\u00a0Wayland Special Road District has no plans to repair the bridge \u2014 but there are no immediate plans to tear it down, either.<\/p>\n

The bridge was built in 1937 and wasn’t on the state highway system until 1980, when the Iowa DOT took over the road running straight south of Donnellson and designated it IA 394. The bridge’s strategic location became more obvious as a four-lane Avenue of the Saints gradually became reality. The old bridge brought traffic to a halt for collecting tolls on the Missouri side while four-lane segments crept closer and closer from both Iowa and Missouri. After the new bridge opened, this one became a free bridge and the toll booth was removed. Pictures of the brief time it was signed as the official Avenue of the Saints, and the co-signing of IA 394 and IA 27, can be found on the\u00a0IA 394 South page<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Now I’m very glad I took the time to drive the bridge and even record a video crossing it in July.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

July 12, 2016: The St. Francisville bridge over the Des Moines River. Well, it finally happened: A dozen years after it was bypassed, the old bridge over the Des Moines River in Lee County has been closed permanently. It was … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7936","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-highway-miscellaneous"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7936","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7936"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7936\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7938,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7936\/revisions\/7938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7936"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7936"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/iowahighwayends.net\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7936"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}