The Iowa Department of Transportation has assembled photo galleries to show some of the unprecedented damage to road and railways from the flooding.
D-O-T spokeswoman, Dena Gray-Fisher, says they have dozens of photos posted on-line. Gray-Fisher says they have field personnel out taking pictures of the damage as the water recedes and in places where the water is still covering the roads. She says so far they’re seeing lots of serious damage.
Gray-Fisher says the photos are an important resource in rebuilding the roads. She says the first objective is to assess the damage and form a plan of action to get the roads back into service. Gray-Fisher says the photos are also a good public information tool, as they show the extend of the damage, that she says people often underestimate. She says it also shows why they can’t always re-open a roadway right away when the floodwaters go down, and shows why you shouldn’t drive over a flooded roadway.
Gray-Fisher says the damage to the roadways is varied as there’s shoulder damage, buckled pavement, displacement of slabs or entire slabs of the highway missing. Photos from three areas stuck out as Gray-Fisher looked them over.
Gray-Fisher says the damage on Iowa Highway one in the Cedar Rapids/Iowa City area that goes from Solon to Mt. Vernon had particularly destructive damage, on U-S 18 between Charles City and New Hampton, and then a bridge that suffered damage in Fort Atkinson. See the picture of the damage to Highway one, and other flood damage on the D-O-T website .