Oct 31

Drowning in a mud pit

Posted on Friday, October 31, 2014, at 5:30 PM by Jeff

How bad is the onslaught of political advertising in Iowa, the state with the second-highest number of Senate-race ads in the country?

During “Jeopardy”, KWWL ran 30 seconds of nothing but a still picture of a woman in a serene position in the outdoors, with the text “Political ad break.”

…and then the ads came back — for Senate, House, governor and everything else.

(Has anyone else noted that Iowa House/Iowa Senate ads never mention the district or even location the candidate is in? How can that possibly be effective?)

Posted in Iowa Miscellaneous | Comments Off on Drowning in a mud pit
Oct 31

IA 926 on chopping block

Posted on Friday, October 31, 2014, at 1:44 PM by Jeff

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
September 11, 2014: The trumpet interchange for the north end of Business 169 includes a road that intersects the west-side ramps.

A line item in the published agenda for next week’s Iowa Transportation Commission meeting has a surprise: “Transfer of Jurisdiction – Iowa 926 in Fort Dodge”.

The state has been turning over sections of urban arterials recently, including IA 92 through Muscatine and University Avenue in Cedar Falls (although the latter has been on the wish list for years). Secret IA 926 is signed as Business US 169, and has two major bridges, including the Karl King Viaduct that was closed in 2009 for urgent repairs. In that light, I’m surprised Fort Dodge is interested in taking over maintenance.

Fort Dodge City Council minutes from July 14 (PDF) and a paywalled Messenger article from the same time show the council already discussed it, so the Tuesday item is likely the last step in the process. I don’t know how much if any money the state is giving Fort Dodge to take the route off its hands.

The transfer would remove the last state maintenance from downtown Fort Dodge. The IA 926 route consists of the former easternmost part of IA 7 that went to the intersection of 8th Street and 5th Avenue, plus the diagonal Kenyon Road built in the mid-1930s as part of US 20. See the Fort Dodge Highway Chronology here. Signage of the business routes will be unaffected; Business 20 is already a mix of state, city, and county jurisdiction.

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Oct 30

US 34 bridge (not that one) opening next week

Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2014, at 4:12 PM by Jeff

I got caught by this construction in September: US 34 between IA 25 and former IA 49 has been closed to build a new bridge over the Platte River. The Creston News-Advertiser says the concrete still needs to be poured for the approaches but the road should be open to traffic the first week of November.

There’s also a sentence about IA 92 west of Greenfield, which is in the middle of a construction project (asphalt resurfacing).

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Oct 30

Plan for US 20 near Correctionville on file

Posted on Thursday, October 30, 2014, at 10:44 AM by Jeff

The meeting was earlier this month, but the document is online. This meeting was for that portion of 20 to be four-laned from the west side of Correctionville and relocated IA 31 to L25. On the map, you can see that the east end has a median barrier and expands after crossing the Little Sioux River. For about half the distance, the new eastbound and westbound lanes will be on either side of the existing roadway (which will be removed). Then, the new grade will be just north, but looks like it’s slightly straighter than the existing one. Insets show there will be some leveling off of surrounding land and the entire highway will be at a higher elevation.

Traffic will be detoured onto old 20 (D22), which Woodbury County will be repaving next year in preparation for the closure of current 20.

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Oct 29

Lagoon issue trips up East Mills school shuffle

Posted on Wednesday, October 29, 2014, at 10:06 AM by Jeff

The former Nishna Valley school, two miles east of Hastings at the intersection of US 34 and old 34, has its own sewage lagoon. That makes it the third one I know of in Iowa. It came to my attention because the East Mills district, formed by a merger of Malvern and Nishna Valley, has pondered future plans that may eventually result in that building’s closure. (Naturally, I find out about this after driving through the area.)

First, the standalone elementary in Malvern was closed this summer. The Council Bluffs Nonpareil reported at the time that the building could reopen temporarily later if a PPEL was passed to build additions to the high school on the north side of Malvern that would house all K-12 students. That vote failed, but the elementary still closed.

Because all the students there were moved to the Nishna Valley school, and that increased attendance, the DNR got involved because of potential issues with lagoon capacity. The DNR told the district that it doesn’t have all the required permits on file. And because there are no permits, any certification requires meeting 2010s standards instead of 1960s.

Two weeks ago, the district looked into a new PPEL vote, although the KMA story does not make clear if this is to fix existing issues with the two locations or trying again on creating one location. The district itself may not have that figured out yet. It hired a lagoon engineer to sort that issue out. It would make little sense for the district to spend money on getting the lagoon up to current standards if the building is going to close in the near future. On the other hand, any future owner/user of the building would have the same problem. Its location, away from everything, could raise real concerns about abandonment.

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Oct 28

Oklahoma week, and the streaks that will not end

Posted on Tuesday, October 28, 2014, at 10:00 AM by Jeff

As we all know, and I have written about at length, Iowa State-Oklahoma is among the most lopsided in-conference series in college football. While rehashing schedules, I stumbled upon another discouraging fact: In the past four years, Oklahoma has lost nine games in the regular season — and four of them came right before Iowa State.

  • 2014: Lost to Kansas State on a blocked PAT and missed field goal, then a bye
  • 2013: Lost to Baylor
  • 2012: Lost to Notre Dame
  • 2011: Lost to Baylor

This year seemed ripe for some longtime streaks to fall, but streaks like these are built on both skill and (bad) luck. Florida, which has already suffered a transitive 76-13 loss to Georgia before this Saturday’s game, needed a delay-of-game non-call to beat Kentucky in triple overtime. Michigan is not having a WOW Experience this year, but Indiana is down to a third-string quarterback.* Those two also play Saturday. In other words: Help us, Maryland-Penn State, you’re our only hope. (Also, I want to get rid of that wasn’t-conference-but-is-now asterisk on the streak chart.)

This year will be the first even-numbered year that Bob Stoops won’t win a conference championship at Oklahoma.

*Indiana has a transitive victory over Florida this year. No, I can’t explain Missouri’s season either.

UPDATE: Hey, Colorado, that’s OUR shtick!

It’s hard to tell sometimes what brand of misery is worse — getting beat like a drum week in and week out or playing competitively but knowing deep down there’s going to be some soul-crushing debacle waiting at the end of the game.

Posted in Sports | Comments Off on Oklahoma week, and the streaks that will not end
Oct 27

Meanwhile, east of Pacific Junction

Posted on Monday, October 27, 2014, at 10:03 AM by Jeff

Here are many of the stories I missed while covering the US 34 bridge opening last week. I hope this means I won’t have a story drought later this week! (If I do, just come back here and read the ones you skipped.)

Posted in Highway Miscellaneous, Schools | Comments Off on Meanwhile, east of Pacific Junction
Oct 24

US 34 opening ceremony article

Posted on Friday, October 24, 2014, at 10:02 AM by Jeff

Yes, more, because it finally opened, it’s been decades in the making, and after driving 670 miles in two days I need recovery time. I hope to have photos up next week.

Posted in Highway Miscellaneous | Comments Off on US 34 opening ceremony article
Oct 22

Photo 26,000

Posted on Wednesday, October 22, 2014, at 10:16 AM by Jeff

June 24, 2014: Entering Missouri on the new I-70 Mississippi River bridge.

My summer Missouri vacation re-clinched I-70 between Denver and central Maryland (3 miles of new road) and clinched the entirety of I-44. Kansas City is used as the pull-through for I-70 starting at the new I-55/64/70 split in East St. Louis. Note the absence of flying cars (per yesterday).

Photo counting beyond this point creates a potential dilemma: I took around 500 photos in the aftermath of the tornado that struck at home. The overall number contains all photos, highway-related or not, so I suppose they should be incorporated. Even without those photos, the rest of the Missouri trip plus subsequent trips have already pushed my total past 27,000.

This is a timed post.
Posted in Highway Miscellaneous, Sequences | Comments Off on Photo 26,000
Oct 21

The future is one year from now

Posted on Tuesday, October 21, 2014, at 6:29 PM by Jeff

Three hundred and sixty-five days from now — to the exact minute of this post — the events of the opening third of “Back to the Future II” take place.

Comcast, which owns Universal, would do good to have the USA Network run the “Back to the Future” trilogy in semi-heavy rotation in 2015. It should be trivial enough to sync the moment Doc says “We are descending toward Hill Valley, California, at 4:29 PM on October 21, 2015” with that exact moment. BTTF trilogy marathons would be way better than the never-ending string of crime procedurals.

After 30 years (really 25 since it was filmed in 1988-89), the most accurate prediction is…a localized USA Today newspaper. Unless, of course, the Cubs win next year’s World Series.

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