September 13, 2021: The 1st Street bridge over Coon Creek is used to get to the Traer airport, although “airport” is generous for the grass strip. In deep background is an old elevator damaged (I think) in the 2020 derecho.
The September Iowa DOT letting included a contract to replace the 1st Street bridge on the east edge of Traer. The contract was let by the state as part of the Federal-Aid Swap Policy, hence “swap” in the project code. (See also here.)
The bridge is a classic pony truss from 1914. This type faded out when the Iowa Highway Commission standardized reinforced concrete bridge designs in the 1920s. Those that remain are rapidly vanishing from rural roads, as even with low traffic numbers the structures are over a century old.
This particular bridge was once part of the Iowa highway system. Primary 58 used this bridge and road (170th Street) to head out of Traer toward Vinton until 1928. I am not 100% sure which street 58 used to switch from 2nd to 1st, though I presume it’s Taylor, the easternmost.
As early as September 1924, there was talk of getting a new route out of town, after a flood wiped out a bridge to the Chicago & North Western depot (the “Ole Depot”, extant today). The Traer Star-Clipper said the new road “would run from the Axon corner through the Sieh land and entering town on Second instead of First street.” Because the landowners in question are long gone, we must consult our friend the county atlas, the ancestor of our friend the plat book.
Here, we can see the first route east of Traer in an arc across the middle of this 1926 Perry Township map clip, along with the Sieh and Axon land. (The “town” of West Union was long dead, even in 1926, and is now a couple houses northeast of the North Tama Athletic Complex.)
The first of two realignments took the highway away from the 1st Street bridge. The new now-IA 8 was completed early in 1928, paralleling the Rock Island Railroad but then heading east on the half-section line through Section 11 (the line/road under the words “West Union”). The remaining diagonal to the bottom of Section 11 and then east didn’t come until 1941.
The 1st Street bridge will be replaced next spring, in its 108th year.