Iowa Highway Ends (etc.)

While looking through old aerial photos of Sioux City I noticed two very little changes to its alignment that I hadn’t included in my map series. (In fact, if I didn’t make this post I doubt they’d be seen at all.)

First, US 75 and the railroad tracks on the south side were in a ramrod-straight diagonal until they were bent around the new I-29/I-129 interchange.

Second, there used to be a slightly different route through Floyd Park south of Transit Avenue, which wasn’t changed until 1981 or 1982. Much of the old road was taken out for the Floyd Park golf course, but there is a short stretch of Williams Avenue and this odd stub of a driveway (Google Satellite View).

I’ve made those changes, and also waffled slightly on how much of US 75 in the city could qualify as a thicker expressway-type line. I may drop that entirely later.

Despite being in the southwest corner of the intersection of Hickman Road and 63rd Street, this position is actually in Urbandale.

Here’s an interesting tidbit I came across last week.

If you look at the DOT city map of Windsor Heights (PDF), you can see that the shaded area goes right up to 63rd Street (IA 28) but a dashed line is visible beside, not on, Hickman Road (US 6) on the north side.

Turns out there’s a reason for that. The city code’s very, VERY dense description of the boundaries (PDF, page 11) includes this segment, emphasis added:

… thence northerly along the centerline of 63rd Street a distance of 2,260 feet, more or less, to the south right-of-way line of Hickman Road … thence westerly along the south right-of-way line of Hickman Road …

So, technically, if one were to be driving east on Hickman, one would still be in Urbandale. Windsor Heights has no jurisdiction over the road.

The code’s next parenthetical reference tells us when Hickman was upgraded to four lanes, but we need a couple rest stops to get through it:

(the location of which line was established pursuant to a Joint Public Improvement Agreement dated May 1, 1969, between the Iowa State Highway Commission and the City of Windsor Heights, Iowa, identified as No. 68-P-175 in connection with Polk County Project No. U-6-4(4)-40-77, which agreement is recorded in the office of the Polk County Recorder in Book 4027, commencing at Page 601, as amended by Amendment to Joint Public Improvement Agreement dated June 16, 1975, between the same parties regarding the same project, which amendment is recorded in the office of the Polk County Recorder in Book 4530, commencing at Page 663)

Woof.