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Interstate 80
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Length in Iowa: 307 miles/494 kilometers
Western terminus: Nebraska state line (Missouri
River) at Council Bluffs
Eastern terminus: Illinois state line
(Mississippi River) at Le Claire
Entrance photos
Counties: Pottawattamie, Cass, Adair, Madison, Dallas, Polk, Jasper, Poweshiek, Iowa, Johnson, Cedar, Scott
Cities along route: Council Bluffs, Underwood, Neola, Shelby, Avoca, Walnut, Adair, Casey, Stuart, Dexter, Earlham, De
Soto, Van Meter, Waukee, West Des Moines, Clive, Grimes, Urbandale, Johnston, Des Moines, Ankeny, Altoona, Bondurant, Mitchellville, Colfax, Newton, Grinnell, Malcom, Williamsburg, Tiffin, Coralville, Iowa City, West Branch, Walcott, Davenport, Bettendorf, Le Claire
Exit lists:
From Exit #1 to Exit #123 (I-35/235)
From Exit #123 to Exit #138 (multiplex with I-35)
From Exit #138 to Exit #239 (I-380/US 218)
From Exit #239 eastward into Illinois
Multiplexes:
7 miles with US 6, from Exit #1A to Exit #8; this includes a 2½-mile triplex with I-29, between exits #1A and #4 through Council Bluffs
50 miles with US 6 (again), from Exit #60 in Cass County to
Exit #110 in Dallas County
14 miles with I-35, from Exit #123 in West Des Moines
to Exit #138 north of Des Moines. (In both Interstate multiplexes, I-80's exit numbers
are used.)
1½ miles with US 65, between exits #141 and #142
in Altoona
22 miles with US 6 (yet again), from Exit #142 in Altoona to Exit #164 near Newton
4 miles with IA 38, from Exit #267 to Exit #271 in Cedar
County
19 more miles with US 6, from Exit #271 north of Wilton to Exit #290 in Davenport
5½ miles with US 61, from Exit #290 to Exit #295 in Davenport
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History
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1954: Plans for a toll road roughly following I-80's present route
-- including a new bridge from Le Claire into Port Byron, IL -- were
approved. However, the passing of the Interstate Highway Act in 1956 shelved
those plans.
September 21, 1958: First segment, from the future western split with I-35 and
Douglas Avenue (now in Urbandale), opened (with I-35)
November 9, 1958: Segment between Douglas Avenue and Merle Hay Road (IA 401) opened
(with I-35)
November 28, 1959: Segments between Merle Hay Road and US 69 north of Des Moines
(with I-35), and between the Adair interchange and IA 25 opened
September 5, 1960: Segments between US 71 and Adair, and between IA 25 and the US 6
interchange east of Dexter, opened
November 17, 1960: Segment between US 69 and the US 6 exit between Colfax and Newton
opened
December 1, 1960: Segment between the western split with IA 38 and US 61 in Davenport opened
August 24, 1962: Segment between old IA 1 (now the Hoover Highway) east of Iowa City and
IA 38 completed
October 8, 1962: Segment between US 6 and IA 14 at Newton opened
November 16, 1962: Segments between IA 14 and IA 146 near Grinnell, and between IA 1 (formerly IA 261) and the old IA 1, opened
November 15, 1963: Segment between US 218 (later IA 965) and IA 1 in the Iowa City area
opened
October 23, 1964: Segment between IA 146 and US 218 opened. William H. Thompson, author
of the book Transportation in Iowa: A Historical Summary (1989), called the completion
of this 56-mile segment "probably the most spectacular effort that Iowa has seen in fifty
years of road building."
November 25, 1964: Segment between US 61 and US 67 at Le Claire opened
December 16, 1965: Segment between US 59 near Avoca and US 71 opened
October 27, 1966: Bridge between US 67 and Illinois opened
December 13, 1966: Segments between the future I-80/I-680 interchange and US
59, and between US 6 and the southwest I-35/80/235 junction, completed.
(At that point, I-680 had been built from I-29 to
I-80 and was designated as I-80N until 1974.)
July 22, 1968: Segment between Madison Avenue and US 6 in Council Bluffs opened
December 22, 1969: Segment between IA 192 and Madison Avenue in Council Bluffs, and between US 6
in Council Bluffs and the I-80/I-680 interchange, opened
November 1, 1970: Segment between I-29 and IA 192 in Council Bluffs completed
December 15, 1972: Last segment, from Nebraska over the Missouri River to I-29,
completed.
August 16, 1995: Bridge over Mississippi River at Le Claire renamed for Fred
Schwengel, a former congressman from Davenport who died in 1993; he was
one of the driving forces behind the Interstate Highway Act.
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Notes
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I-80 between Earlham and I-35 was originally proposed to follow IA 90 (now County Road F90) closer to the Raccoon River, until the Highway Commission decided to move it to its present route on October 2, 1963. The interchange of I-35 and Grand Avenue was built as a cloverleaf because of the original plans. (The cloverleaf was eliminated in 2013 and 2014 as part of the I-35 widening project.)
Improvements to I-80 (as well as I-29 and I-480) in Council Bluffs are underway; more information is available here. The segment through Council Bluffs involved construction of a "dual, divided freeway" for the I-29/80 multiplex (detailed here) with three local lanes and three express lanes in each direction. The westbound express lanes opened March 27, 2019, while the eastbound lanes opened August 19, 2019. Reconstruction of the interchange with Madison Avenue is planned for 2023 and 2024.
Widening of I-80 between I-380 and IA 1 in the Iowa City area was completed in two segments: the segment through Coralville opened to six lanes in 2009, and the segment through Iowa City opened to six lanes in October 2012. An extension of the six-lane segment eastward to West Branch is underway, with widening programmed through 2025; the six-lane segment through the reconstructed Herbert Hoover Highway interchange opened in late 2023. The segment from the western I-35/I-235 interchange in West Des Moines to US 65 in Altoona, including all of the multiplex with I-35, was widened from four to six lanes by the end of 2000. Widening of the segment from Grand Prairie Parkway to Jordan Creek Parkway in West Des Moines is programmed from 2023 through 2025, while widening of the segment through Urbandale and Clive to eight lanes (including reconstruction of the Hickman Road interchange into a diverging diamond) is programmed for 2025 through 2027. Work to add a fourth lane in each direction between the East Mixmaster and US 65 is expected to be finished by the fall of 2028.
Reconstruction of the interchange with I-80 and I-380 to replace all of the cloverleaf loops with flyover ramps was completed with the opening of the last two ramps on August 30, 2023.
In 2017, the Iowa DOT released a preliminary design for a "full-build conceptual layout" of the East Mixmaster that involves reconstructing almost all exit ramps. As it stands, replacement of the left exit from eastbound I-80 to northbound I-35 at the East Mixmaster system interchange with a new flyover ramp began in 2022 and is expected to be finished in the fall of 2024. This project also involves new ramps between eastbound I-80 and westbound I-235 (opened December 1, 2023), and between westbound I-80 and northbound I-35 (to be completed in the fall of 2024). Meanwhile, work to replace the loop ramp from I-35 south to I-235 west and the ramp where I-80 splits from I-35 at the West Mixmaster system interchange is programmed for 2027 and 2028. Refer to the Iowa DOT's Des Moines Area Interstate Projects page for more information about these projects.
A planning study is also underway for future replacement of the Fred Schwengel Memorial Bridge as part of a study of the I-80 corridor between SW 35th Street in Le Claire and the I-88 interchange in East Moline, IL. Seven potential bridge alternatives were identified by May 2022; the preferred alternative of a new bridge immediately to the west of the existing bridge was revealed on November 15, 2023. Additional information can be found at https://www.i80mississippibridge.com/.
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