The Dallas County Secondary Roads Department put a large focus on rehabilitating bridges in the county this year. 

County Engineer Al Miller states they have completed two major projects that include the bridge Northeast of Minburn on 170th Street, East of Pioneer Avenue and the bridge near Dallas Center on Alice’s Road. Miller adds they are currently working on the bridge on 270th West of County Road P58 near Adel.  He tells Raccoon Valley Radio why these projects needed to be worked on.

“You probably heard a lot of things in the news about the poor bridges in Iowa, but those have been the focus of the bridge funding that’s available to get those projects taken care of. And all three of those were listed as ‘poor.’ We do have some coming up in our five year program that are designed to reduce the number of poor bridges that we have in Dallas County.”

Miller notes that bridges that are rated in poor condition are still safe for vehicles to travel on but there might be a weight limit or those structures were designed in the early 1900s. He points out the next major bridge project will be on Pioneer Avenue just North of 170th Street.