When the Mount Vernon-Lisbon US 30 bypass opened without any signs indicating a Business 30, I figured the DOT had simply decided against one. Either I was wrong or someone’s mind changed.
The spring 2020 meeting of the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials included an application from Iowa for a Business 30 in Linn County. The business route uses IA 1, old 30 (temporarily designated IA 830), and a new road angling southeastward to the Lisbon exit. As of the end of 2021, there were no signs. Either new BGSs have to be erected or, more economically, “Business 30” standalone signs put up by them.
Lack of an official Business 30 designation didn’t stop either town from marking the old road that way on street signs, including this one where it intersects the Lincoln Highway east of Lisbon and is not on the applied-for business route, and this one at the west end of the bypassed alignment also not on the applied-for business route.
I am unsure about signage status for the Lincoln Highway Heritage Byway in the area. One option is to use Adams Avenue (which does not intersect the bypass), a newly built road named Old Lincoln Highway, and a bit of now-paved Charles Avenue. That makes more sense than doubling back to the interchange, and the name of the new road is likely a clue, but that route involves a left turn off 30 for westbound Lincoln Highway travelers.
The application to AASHTO also included a “cleanup” of the newly truncated I-680 route to remove its overlap with I-29 and officially make the Crescent interchange 680’s east end.
The draft 2023-27 five-year construction plan includes this entry in Linn County: “IA 1 interchange in Mount Vernon … Traffic Signs” for $110,000. Might this put Business 30 on BGSs? We’ll have to wait and see.