It’s very hard to get a second life going for a school building. Let’s hope this is a success.
Parts of the Coggon school may have been unused longer than others, given the building’s heavy presence in aggregators. Based on school board minutes, it looks like the elementary was in use until sometime last school year.
He’s been giving the weather in eastern Iowa as long as I’ve been alive. It will be weird to watch the news without him. The story does not say what he’s moving on to.
From left: U.S. Rep. Tom Latham, U.S. Sen. Tom Harkin, Waukee Mayor Bill Peard, U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley and Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad hold shovels for the groundbreaking ceremony for the extension of Alice’s Road in Waukee on Friday.
The theme at Friday’s groundbreaking for the Alice’s Road extension in Waukee was persistence. Each member of Congress present — Sens. Chuck Grassley and Tom Harkin, and Rep. Tom Latham — remarked about how city officials would consistently and persistently bother remind them about the need for financial support. The best exchange:
Grassley, in closing: Waukee Mayor Bill Peard said he’d be willing to rename the road for whichever senator got the money through. “I said I don’t want it to be named after me, because I want Alice to vote for me!”
Harkin, in opening: “Sen. Grassley wants Alice to vote for him? I didn’t know you were coming in from Chicago!”
Harkin also remarked that since Grassley is on the Finance Committee (which takes your money), and he’s on the Appropriations Committee (which spends your money), Iowans can be mad at both of them!
Harkin credited Latham for his role in shepherding the money through the House Appropriations Committee and then their work in conference committee.
Gov. Terry Branstad spoke first, talking about Waukee’s and Dallas County’s rapid growth and how this corridor would continue that.
All the speeches were given inside a tent on the south side of the intersection of Alice’s Road and University Avenue. All were relatively short, since the governor had a tight schedule. The groundbreaking followed, with a bunch of shovels on a pile of dirt placed for the occasion. After the main dignitaries, as shown in the top photo, Waukee and West Des Moines officials also got their turn with shovels.
The cornfield behind the groundbreaking area had already been harvested. From now on it will be a focus of suburban development. (I wrote about that 13 months ago.)
KCCI has a story, but the accompanying video is about Hickman Road, not Alice’s Road.
With it being Halloween and all, here’s a scary story from the Waterloo Courier regarding University Avenue, old US 218, between IA 58 and US 63.
But those speaking at the hearing were more concerned about the “preferred” design, which includes 11 roundabout intersections, reducing the road from six to four lanes in most places and adding bicycle lanes and recreational trails.
ELEVEN ROUNDABOUTS. In a span of less than five miles. One would be at the east end with US 63, making that at least the third roundabout in the state involving a signed state/US road.
If the state wants to get traffic off University Avenue, that would be a surefire way to do it. Business owners along the route hate the idea, and with good reason.
The plan is broken into two PDF files, a writeup, and a video on the DOT’s website. There is no timetable for actual construction yet.
Yes, University Avenue doesn’t serve quite the same purpose now as it did when it carried 218, and yes, it is time for a complete rebuilding of the road. But that is not the way to do it.
It is difficult to track and chronicle the statewide makeup of athletic conferences on the Iowa high school level. Mergers and attrition have brought the Cornbelt Conference in the northwest down to six members this school year, right before it disintegrates completely.
Unlike the top college levels, though, the Iowa conference process has more or less been perpetually shifting, with no signs of letting up.
The newest change may be in northern Iowa, where the Mitchell County News reports that Riceville may drop out of the Corn Bowl Conference after a proposal to merge the Corn Bowl and North Iowa conferences was floated. Its next home may be the Iowa Star Conference, although the nearest current member is Janesville, over an hour away.
Riceville has really been hammered in the past decade enrollment-wise. It’s lost a quarter of its student population and dropped to 8-man football.
North Tama and GMG both entered the Iowa Star a decade ago because they were the smallest schools in the North Iowa Cedar League.
The bigger story is that “superconference.” The linked article says there could be up to 20 teams in two divisions. Are there other such proposals on the horizon? We’ll have to wait and see.
East of Peosta, US 20 leaves the straight line running from Farley and turns northeast to Dubuque. Fifty years ago, there was a Highway Commission concept to run 20 straight east into Illinois, but budget and topographical considerations ensured it would never be more than a dotted line on a map. The entire portion in Dubuque County is an expressway, meaning there are multiple at-grade intersections.
US 20 intersects Swiss Valley Road as it turns. Swiss Valley Road is a paved connection from US 20 to US 151, even though it’s two-lane and winding. The intersection has been the site of multiple accidents. KWWL reports that plans from 2006 to modify the intersection have been brought up again by the relative of a recent accident victim.
It’s not Iowa, no, but it might become an addendum to my note about recent interstate creations in the Midwest — and affect my plans to travel every interstate in Illinois.
West of O’Hare Airport in suburban Chicago, a freeway that has had no numerical designation abruptly begins at US 20 and ends at I-290. It’s called the Elgin-O’Hare Expressway, but wags have often noted it goes to neither place.
It’s finally been given a number, IL 390, a number that would seem deliberately chosen. Will it at some point be signed at I-390? This WLS-TV report thinks so.
The freeway will also be extended to near O’Hare, fulfilling at least one end of the plan from long ago. However, there is a catch: It will be built as a toll road. In fact, the existing stretch may be tolled too, a changeover that would be accomplished by making it all-electronic. This press release from the state has more.
Probably not going to get to the C’s before the new year but we’ll see.
On a related note, are the old REAP and college football plates, especially the stamped ones, being replaced too? It seems like those are just as much of an issue as the older regular ones.
July 5, 2013: This ear of corn on the Coon Rapids welcome sign on Iowa Highway 141 slowly rotates.
Coon Rapids is best known for being the site of Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev’s visit to Iowa in 1959. Farmer and seed corn developer Roswell Garst invited him to come. There was a 50th anniversary celebration of the trip in 2009.
This harvest is the last for Garst brand seed. Syngenta is rolling it into Golden Harvest.
The worst football season in North Tama history and the worst in Traer in half a century ended Friday with a 38-0 shutout by Belle Plaine. With a record of 1-8 (1-5), it’s the first time since 2005 that the Redhawks won’t be in the postseason. The District 4 standings are in perfect descending order of victories.
Traer High was winless in 1939 and had one win each year 1957-60; Traer-Clutier went 1-8 in 1962. North Tama has gone 2-7 three times.
Also, the IHSAA’s entire website has been redesigned. I forgot to mention that in the earlier blog post about team nicknames. The new site was up about two weeks ago. It’s the first redesign in a long time.
