Residents in a number of northeast Iowa communities are cleaning up after weekend flooding, but the town of Manchester is under a bit of a deadline. The Delaware County town is set to host up to 20,000 visitors when RAGBRAI rolls through on Friday.
Timothy Vick is the city manager in Manchester. “We’re looking forward to them coming, but right now we’re scrambling to get things resolved and take care of some of the issues we have from the flooding,” Vick said.
Those issues include a wastewater treatment plant that was surrounded by floodwaters. Vick says repairs are being made to the plant, but currently the water coming into the plant is only being partially treated. “It looks like we survived pretty well,” Vick said. “We have a few areas that need additional attention, but right now it looks like everything is at least operational and we’re moving forward.”
More than a dozen businesses along West Main Street in Manchester were under water on Saturday. Vick believes many of those businesses will be back open by Friday.
Most of the areas of town where RAGBRAI riders will be visiting or camping are dry. Vick says one campground area was under water, but if it’s not ready by Friday, there’s plenty of room to move people who planned to camp there. “We have over 120 acres of campground available and only one small section of about 11 acres was impacted by the flooding,” Vick said.
More information on RAGBRAI’s stop in Manchester: http://www.manchesterragbrai.com/