Flood of 2008: I-80 closure will be costly

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By Tom Saul | Thursday, June 12, 2008 7:02 PM CDT | () comments

Drivers who travel Interstate 80 across the state face a 110-mile detour around flooding of the Cedar River in Cedar County.

Floodwaters are expected to flow over the highway through the weekend.

The Iowa Department of Transportation blocked off a section of the interstate on either side of the river at exits 265 and 267 beginning Thursday night as the Cedar swelled out of its banks at record levels, said Dena Gray-Fisher, a spokesman for the agency.

“This is something new for us,” Gray-Fisher said. “We’ve never seen water to this extent on the Cedar before. Some of the gauges we watch shows that it is likely to reach a 500-year flood stage. The rain (Thursday) didn’t help matters.”

Truckers and trucking companies expect serious disruptions in the form of lost time and higher costs as they try to move freight back and forth across eastern Iowa. Traffic around the blockage will be routed from the Quad-Cities to Dubuque on U.S. 61, across U.S. 20 to Interstate 35 and back to Des Moines, adding about 110 miles to an eastbound or westbound trip.

The original detour route on U.S. 30 was abandoned because of flooding in that corridor near Cedar Rapids.

“When you figure that fuel costs about $5 a gallon and truckers get about five miles to the gallon, you’re looking at a lot of extra money drivers are going to have to pay out of their own pockets because of this,” said Doug Petry, assistant terminal manager for Daily Express, a Bettendorf trucking company that uses I-80 extensively.

I-80 is one of the most heavily used truck routes in the state, said Brenda Nevill, president of the Iowa Motor Truck Association, an advocacy group for the state’s trucking industry. She had no figures for the number of trucks that use it daily, but it is likely in the thousands.

“Something like the closing of a major interstate is extremely disruptive,” Nevill said. “It reroutes truck traffic onto side roads and makes it more difficult for everyone.”

The association has been attempting to contact its members, other drivers and truck stop owners through e-mails and phone calls to warn them of the anticipated closure, Nevill said. At the Iowa 80 Truck Stop near Walcott, Heather Debaillie said the business would be able to handle any backup of trucks caused by the blockage.

Because of the flooding, the DOT has also instituted a temporary ban on oversized loads, the agency said in a news release. Any hauler with an oversized load, even if a permit was already issued, is asked to park it “until the situation eases.”

Cedar County emergency workers and volunteers are battling high water in a number of communities along the river, said Mary Varva, county emergency management coordinator. Voluntary evacuations have been requested in four communities. Those will likely turn into mandatory evacuations as the water continues to rise.

A shelter has been opened at Calvary Foursquare Church on Iowa 38 in Tipton, Varva said. No one had taken up residence in the shelter as of Thursday afternoon.

Tom Saul can be contacted at (563) 383-2453 or tsaul@qctimes.com.