Following the announcement of the local route through Greene County for this year’s Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa (RAGBRAI), some county officials are getting involved.

Greene County Engineer Wade Weiss says the route includes coming from Carroll County into Greene County on County Road E-53, through Dubar Slough and the city of Jefferson to Iowa Highway 144, south on County Road P-40, and then to County Road E-57 through Rippey and into Boone County. Weiss points out the first part of the route will be a high priority.

“That pavement is lightly traveled. It’s very beneficial for those individuals over there, but it’s one of our less traveled roads and has seen less maintenance consequently. So we’re going to have to have quite a bit of maintenance in that four mile section.     

Weiss adds they will get the work done to prepare the full 24 miles that RAGBRAI utilizes on the county road system. 

“We’re going to have to concentrate our efforts on this, as you can understand. We do have a small concrete patching crew with the county forces. They do an excellent job, get a lot of compliments on the work that they’ve done.” 

The Greene County Board of Supervisors are also going to consider an ordinance specifically for when RAGBRAI arrives on July 25th for vendors in the rural areas along the route as well.