September 17, 2007: Now it’s really the end of IA 196.
The route of US 71 in Iowa will undergo a significant change in 2015 and a new state highway will be created.
Among the DOT’s public lettings for Jan. 21 was a “traffic signs” project in Sac County. US 71 will replace all of IA 196 and then follow the US 20 expressway to Early. IA 175 will be the sole signed highway through Lake View. Old 71 between 175 and 20 will become IA 471. This number, obviously intended to create a connection to the old number just like Business 61 through Davenport is IA 461, is the highest to be signed immediately as such, and replaces 428 as Iowa’s highest signed number outside the 900s.
(If 471 is going to stick around, I wish a two-digit number had been recycled instead, like 36 since it was there for Wall Lake, or IA 39 extended east and north from Odebolt.)
This is only the third change to US 71 easily visible on a state map since World War II, following the Clarinda and Storm Lake bypasses. Minor changes affected the Arnolds Park, Lyman, and Grant areas.
Signs on US 20 that are less than three years old must be replaced to reflect the route changes. All IA 471 shields, and the markers on the BGSs, will be oblong instead of square. The change will decrease the total National Highway System mileage in Iowa, since the east-west segment will be dropped, and give 71 its second expressway segment in Iowa.
Iowa Highway 196 was born April 29, 1935, to maintain a Sac City-Carroll connection when US 71 was moved to run south from (old) US 20 near Early. Its exact date of death is unknown at this time.