Nov 07

What’s worse than a roundabout?

Posted on Tuesday, November 7, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

Waterloo Courier:

CEDAR FALLS – City officials are preparing to begin the third and final phase of the University Avenue project in 2018, which includes a double roundabout at the on- and off-ramps at Iowa Highway 58’s interchange.

Posted in Construction | Comments Off on What’s worse than a roundabout?
Nov 06

Northeast Hamilton one step closer to elimination

Posted on Monday, November 6, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

Late last month, the Webster City and Northeast Hamilton school districts approved reorganization petitions for a vote in April. The story from the Webster City Freeman-Journal mentions “two possible district maps” and I admit I don’t know what this means unless it includes some land being parceled out to other districts.

The combined district will span the entire northern half of Hamilton County, and really should be called North Hamilton, but Webster City’s enrollment outnumbers NEH nearly eight-to-one so there’s not really room to make such a demand.

The Webster City school board minutes from Oct. 12 (available as download-only PDF here) shows that Northeast Hamilton will remain a K-6 attendance center for the reorganized district.

A consolidation will put all of Hamilton County, except a three-mile-wide strip on the east side running south of County Road D41, into three districts — Webster City, South Hamilton, and Stratford. However, that’s only two high schools; Stratford has been sending its 7-12 students to Webster City for 30 years yet remains independent.

Posted in Schools | Comments Off on Northeast Hamilton one step closer to elimination
Nov 03

100th anniversary of Merle Hay’s death

Posted on Friday, November 3, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff


June 20, 2017: The centerpiece of the Merle Hay monument in Glidden has artwork from “Ding” Darling. Click here for larger version.

One hundred years ago today, Merle Hay of Glidden became the first Iowan and one of the first three Americans to die in combat in World War I. He was 20 years old. The state of Iowa funded a monument to Hay, which was dedicated on Memorial Day 1930. Merle Hay Road and Mall are named for him, but the story behind the name isn’t told much.

The Annals of Iowa had a feature about Hay and Glidden in 1967, on the 50th anniversary.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
Monuments to all of Glidden’s Civil War (left) and World War (right) dead in the Glidden cemetery. Besides Hay, 10 other Glidden soldiers lost their lives in the war.

Posted in Iowa Miscellaneous | Comments Off on 100th anniversary of Merle Hay’s death
Nov 02

‘Bridge Fest – The Last Drive’

Posted on Thursday, November 2, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

IF
September 27, 2015: A boat passes under the US 52/IA 64 Savanna-Sabula bridge. A new bridge has been built immediately downstream (foreground) over the past two years.

The easternmost bridge in Iowa had a “closing ceremony” Oct. 21. A parade of vintage and antique cars led the way across the bridge weeks before its successor is scheduled to open. Story: KWQC; photo gallery: Quad-City Times; head-on photo, Carroll County News.

The new bridge’s opening date has been set for Nov. 11 – Veterans Day — and it will be named for Savanna native Dale Gardner, a Navy captain who became an astronaut.

Posted in Construction | Comments Off on ‘Bridge Fest – The Last Drive’
Nov 01

Iowa’s brain drain and the 2016 election

Posted on Wednesday, November 1, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

I’ve made a lot of blog posts and writeups about Iowa population and politics-adjacent issues, but the 2016 election brought forth a forehead-smacking-obvious postulate that eluded me until June*:

If level of education becomes a political factor, Iowa’s “brain drain” has been so widespread and persistent that it has consequences for the composition of the electorate.

Since college-educated adults have been abandoning Iowa for decades while the overall number of Americans with degrees is going up, it follows that the state will be an outlier in this area. Iowa has the best high school graduation rate in the nation, but that’s less helpful if it’s not enough “to meet the country’s future workforce needs”.

  • Iowa is the 37th-most-educated (or 14th-least-educated) state as measured by percentage of residents over age 25 with a bachelor’s degree. Iowa was the only state to have a statistically significant decline in that number in 2015. (24/7 Wall Street, based on Census Bureau data)
  • “Iowa… is losing a net of some 3,200 highly educated people annually.” (Omaha World-Herald, Dec. 12, 2016)

Being behind the curve on this isn’t a new development. According to Census Bureau numbers and reports, 16.9% of Iowans age 25 and up had a bachelor’s or more in 1990, when the national rate was 20.3% (p.3); a quarter-century later, 28% had a degree but the national rate had risen to 33.4%.

Barack Obama swept four education groups — no college/some college/degree/postgrad — in Iowa in 2008 and 2012 (NYT), when a degree or lack thereof wasn’t an indicator of partisan leaning. In 2016, that changed. The headlines are all you need, but the links have more:

So if (IF) not having a college degree becomes any sort of reliable proxy for party alignment in the future — and IF the Driftless Area is in a permanent shift — Iowa may prove a tougher challenge for Democrats unless and until the brain drain is neutralized … or the Republicans end up four-flushing the hand they’ve been dealt.

(Holy run-on conclusion, Batman.)

*And then I sat on this for so long the New York Times beat me to the punch.

Posted in Iowa Miscellaneous | Comments Off on Iowa’s brain drain and the 2016 election
Oct 31

North Tama volleyball one step from state

Posted on Tuesday, October 31, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

In the span of three school years — fall 2010 to spring 2013 — North Tama sports had their best overall period in school history. Those three years included appearances in the state tournament in four different sports: football (state champion, 2010), girls’ basketball (first round, 2012), baseball (first round, 2012), and boys’ basketball (fourth place, 2013). Those followed the threepeat girls’ state track championships in 2007-09.

Four years after all that, the Redhawks are on the cusp of making it to the big show in another sport, volleyball. NT beat Montezuma on Thursday night, digging out of a 2-set deficit.

The regional final against Coon Rapids-Bayard will be played tonight at 7 PM in Nevada. Nevada High School is on the east side of town; take the exit on the east side, go north, turn left on H Avenue (softball diamond). Unfortunately, there wasn’t enough advance notice to reschedule trick-or-treating in Traer.

GO REDHAWKS!

UPDATE: It’s a sweep! With scores of 25-10, 25-18, and 25-18, NT swept CRB to make state volleyball for the first time in history! NT will play next Wednesday against (gulp) Springville.

UPDATE 2: Full brackets out. Half the 2A bracket is private schools, but at least they play each other.

VB17Class2AMiddle

Posted in Schools, Sports, Tama County | Comments Off on North Tama volleyball one step from state
Oct 30

The world turned upside down, continued

Posted on Monday, October 30, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

A mini-roundup of the reverberation of Iowa State’s sudden hot streak and the fully armed and operational Big 12 circular firing squad:

Washington Post:

It has reached the point where we might as well go ahead and say there are people who live in Ames, people who visit Ames sometimes, or people who attend football games in Ames, and then there are the rest of us losers.

Dallas Morning News:

Above all else, the Cyclones’ 14-7 win over fourth-ranked TCU reinforces an old truism: Whatever can go wrong with the Big 12, will go wrong.

The Ringer:

Not only are the Cyclones for real, they’re on a despondent mission to wreck the Big 12 from the inside out.

Cosmos magazine:

Universe shouldn’t exist, CERN physicists conclude

Posted in Sports | Comments Off on The world turned upside down, continued
Oct 29

The world turned upside down

Posted on Sunday, October 29, 2017, at 11:00 AM by Jeff

(Still can’t even.)

Posted in Sports | Comments Off on The world turned upside down
Oct 27

Oskaloosa bypass plans finalized

Posted on Friday, October 27, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

A “preferred alternative” for a northwest Oskaloosa bypass of US 63 has been selected and many preliminary studies have been completed. A meeting Nov. 2 at the Oskaloosa library Middle School, the first in nearly three years, will have information about the bypass. The PDF is already online.

Under the bypass plan, US 63 would follow existing IA 163 around the southwest side of Oskaloosa, then northwest on 163 to a new interchange northwest of what was the end of IA 432. A two-lane road would angle northeast to just south of the Skunk River. This will eliminate 63 through Oskaloosa, creating an open route (save for the new interchange ramps) from US 34 to New Sharon.

The bypass would also mark the westernmost point of US 63 north of the Arkansas-Louisiana line. The Louisiana portion of 63 (the existence of which I have ranted about before) hovers roughly along the same line of longitude as the Eddyville-to-New-Sharon segment in Iowa, but is just a bit more west at Junction City.

Posted in Construction | Comments Off on Oskaloosa bypass plans finalized
Oct 26

US 20 enthusiast plugging away in Iowa

Posted on Thursday, October 26, 2017, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

Bryan Farr, who has made multiple trips to and through Iowa promoting the original route of US 20 across the nation, was back in the state earlier this month. He wants old 20 signed across the state, but needs counties and cities’ support. (This is similar to what David Darby is doing with US 6.)

I’m sorry this isn’t timelier, but I do want to call as much attention to his efforts as I can.

Posted in Highway Miscellaneous | Comments Off on US 20 enthusiast plugging away in Iowa