Iowa Highway Ends (etc.)

Starting Monday, the IA 136 bridge over the Mississippi River will be closed until November. The Iowa DOT just says “repairs” in the press release and uses Google Maps to show the detour. KROS Radio in Clinton says it’s for a deck overlay project.

This is a major bummer for the Lincoln Highway Middle Third Tour, which is going from Joliet to Cheyenne along the 1928 route* later this month. The present US 30 bridge did not open until 30 years after the Lincoln was gone, and the present 136 bridge is the closest equivalent.

*Technically, the Blair cutoff didn’t happen until 1930, but it’s complicated, and the Lincoln still had enough cachet that markers were moved, and getting through the area will be bad enough thanks to going through during the College World Series.

The IA 9/WI 82 bridge at Lansing has been closed again. The bridge was closed starting May 17 after one of the existing bridge’s piers moved. This isn’t the first time this has happened during construction of the bridge’s replacement right next to it.

An Iowa DOT press release says the bridge will be closed at least through the Memorial Day weekend. It also says there is no timeline for making any repairs to the existing bridge nor when it might reopen.

The reconstruction of the Boyson Road exit on I-380 takes another step today. Part of the new bridge for the diverging diamond interchange has been built. Today and tomorrow — maybe — traffic will be switched to this bridge so the old one can be taken down. That will require closing Boyson Road over the interstate.

I say “maybe” because the original press release says “weather permitting” and it’s supposed to rain all day. It’s a 100% chance of rain wheeeee. (And I have to drive somewhere. Sigh.)

The southbound I-380 on/off ramps at Boyson have been closed since April 8.

It’s going to be hard to get from US 20 to US 30 in Grundy and Marshall counties this spring — and more is on the way.

As of Monday, the highway has a major closure between IA 175 and IA 96 to replace a bridge over Wolf Creek. There is also a minor closure north of Grundy Center.

During the 2025 construction season, this is how southbound IA 14 runs in the area: IA 14, D35, T37, IA 175, T29, IA 96, IA 14. Coming from the east on IA 175 to the west end of the IA 14 multiplex, eastbound 175 will be also signed as both “North 14” and “Detour South 14.” Through Grundy Center, westbound 175 will also be signed as “South 14” and “Detour North 14.”

Later this year (the contract was let in April), IA 330 will be closed north of US 30 to replace culverts north of the Iowa River bridge.* When that starts, the road through Albion will be closed and traffic detoured on US 30 and IA 14.

That means that instead of simply using IA 14 and IA 330 between US 20 and 30, a driver will have to go through Marshalltown and then follow two other detours.

Also, this post counts as both notification and my official complaint that the Iowa DOT’s website has been updated to the style used by other state websites, even though it might not necessarily make sense. Worse, a landing page dedicated to public meeting and construction PDFs has been decommissioned.

*It’s kind of odd to try to look something up and have multiple links on the first Google page BE STUFF I WROTE. This is not the first time this has happened!