Next year's big road project--the rehabilitation of the Bluffton Road

What Locust Road was for the City of Decorah this year in terms of being a major road project, Bluffton Road will be next year for Winneshiek County.

Plans for the rehabilitation of the surface of Bluffton Road for its entire length--from County A18 on the north to Pole Line Road on the south--have been completed and sent to Ames for the Iowa Department of Transportation to review in time for a March bid opening.

While the 13-mile length of the project is fairly major, County Engineer Lee Bjerke says the project should go pretty quickly once it starts.  Winneshiek County will use four different types of funds to pay for the estimated $3.6 million cost--Surface Transportation Fund money, Highway Safety Fund money, Farm to Market regional funds and $500,000 in local funds.

The project will be a "rehabilitation" of the road surface, not a completely new roadbed.  However, Bluffton Road is one of the major roads in the county, so the work is being done with an eye to making sure the road can continue to handle such traffic loads.