Another interstate highway on Wikipedia as the article of the day, this time it's the Iowa section of Interstate (or I) 80. I would like to visit Iowa someday to visit some family friends in the town of Riverside, not far Iowa City, close to I-80. Fun fact: Riverside, Iowa is the future birthplace of Star Trek's Captain James Kirk, as the town holds the annual Star Trek days every June.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_80_in_Iowa
Getting your article as "today's featured article" is a hell of a lot of work, and US road articles like this are done by roadgeeks like you and me. This particular one was done by an Iowa roadgeek under the pen name Fredddie (I'm friends with him on Facebook but I don't know if he's cool with me giving him a real-name shoutout).
One must wonder what an Iowa Turnpike would've looked like and what exactly it would've connected to on the east end. An extended East-West Tollway? Or a different tollway along what is now I-80?
Quote from: Brandon on July 21, 2018, 06:11:12 PM
One must wonder what an Iowa Turnpike would've looked like and what exactly it would've connected to on the east end. An extended East-West Tollway? Or a different tollway along what is now I-80?
Chances are it would have been similar to today's I-80; the endpoints (Council Bluffs/Davenport) would be designed to serve the more populated areas along the state's eastern & western edges. It may have been routed to travel a bit closer to Cedar Rapids than the current alignment near Iowa City in order to provide more convenient service to that larger population center.
IIRC there is a copy of the Coverdale & Colpitts engineering study for the Iowa Turnpike on one of the scanned-books online portals (Hathi Trust, maybe?).
Quote from: Scott5114 on July 21, 2018, 04:32:21 AM
Getting your article as "today's featured article" is a hell of a lot of work, and US road articles like this are done by roadgeeks like you and me. This particular one was done by an Iowa roadgeek under the pen name Fredddie (I'm friends with him on Facebook but I don't know if he's cool with me giving him a real-name shoutout).
I've seen Fredddie's work on some TX-related Wikipedia articles before.
I saw the I-80 featured article link after the fact, then forgot about it.
Quote from: Desert Man on July 20, 2018, 10:20:58 PM
Another interstate highway on Wikipedia as the article of the day, this time it's the Iowa section of Interstate (or I) 80. I would like to visit Iowa someday to visit some family friends in the town of Riverside, not far Iowa City, close to I-80. Fun fact: Riverside, Iowa is the future birthplace of Star Trek's Captain James Kirk, as the town holds the annual Star Trek days every June.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_80_in_Iowa
We'll be glad to have you. We have many famous roads going through our state (Lincoln, Jefferson, US 6 and 20) and some great, well-marked scenic byways.
Quote from: Brandon on July 21, 2018, 06:11:12 PM
One must wonder what an Iowa Turnpike would've looked like and what exactly it would've connected to on the east end. An extended East-West Tollway? Or a different tollway along what is now I-80?
I found this map from the now-defunct Des Moines Tribune of August 4, 1954, on newspapers.com. From Merle Hay Road eastward it would have followed I-80's present route, but it would have run much closer to the western suburbs (Clive and Urbandale) than the eventual I-35/80 did.
(https://www.aaroads.com/forum/proxy.php?request=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.iowahighways.org%2Fphotos%2FDSMTurnpike1954.png&hash=0d4c4dc89f4450da9ee9e3421bfcb0855e8f9192)
Quote from: Desert Man on July 20, 2018, 10:20:58 PM
Another interstate highway on Wikipedia as the article of the day, this time it's the Iowa section of Interstate (or I) 80. I would like to visit Iowa someday to visit some family friends in the town of Riverside, not far Iowa City, close to I-80. Fun fact: Riverside, Iowa is the future birthplace of Star Trek's Captain James Kirk, as the town holds the annual Star Trek days every June.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interstate_80_in_Iowa
i have attended many trek fests. the link is trek fest (http://trekfest.org/). i went through the town again this year during ragbrai®.
for a silly song about this highway, see interstate 80 iowa (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-mn16d8hs04).
I've been to Iowa but it's been about 10 years since I've been there. Just remember a lot of farm fields on I-80 on my way to Des Moines.
Quote from: Flint1979 on August 23, 2018, 05:27:46 AM
I've been to Iowa but it's been about 10 years since I've been there. Just remember a lot of farm fields on I-80 on my way to Des Moines.
most of iowa is boring i m o. the song emphasizes that.
northeast has some interesting sights mostly along the miss. also, the western counties have the loess hills, which are pretty in spots. i like the magnificent view of the capitol in d. m. from around sixth, and there is another view which i find spectacular (for iowa) there: tenth st north from locust.
ia-3, u-61, and u-52 also offer some scenery.
hope you come back, and maybe we can meet up!