116 3rd St SE
Cedar Rapids, Iowa 52401
Iowa DOT faces ‘massive workload’ to repair median barriers damaged in January storms
I-80 between Davenport and Des Moines had most strikes of cable barriers
More than 200 vehicles struck cable barriers on Interstate 80 medians during back-to-back snowstorms in January — which is a lot considering the state usually has about 900 strikes for the whole winter on all interstates in Iowa.
“It was a lot more than what I would say a normal period of time would be,” said John Hart, director of the Iowa Department of Transportation’s Maintenance Bureau. “In the events we had — those two storms — that corridor, particularly from Davenport to Des Moines, was the most intense.”
More than 330 crashes were reported to the Iowa State Patrol from Jan. 8-14, when up to 2 feet of snow fell on parts of the state. No fatalities were reported, but snow-covered roads and blowing snow caused hundreds of motorists to flip, slide or swerve off roadways.
Since 2003, Iowa has used median barriers that include woven steel cables spaced between steel posts to keep motorists who careen off the road from crashing into cars traveling the opposite direction.
If you’ve driven on I-80 since the storms, you’ll see many barriers are a mangled mess and in some cases steel posts have been flattened or pulled from the ground. Colorful markers indicate sections that need to be repaired.
This is what the Iowa DOT and contractors hired by the agency are doing now.
“We want to get that done because that's a key safety feature on the roadway,” Hart said. But because the damage happened over just two weeks and is heavier in some geographic areas, “they have a massive workload all at once.”
When a vehicle crashes into a cable barrier and a law enforcement agency is called, the Iowa DOT works with the driver or insurance companies to pay for the cost of repairing the barrier, Hart said. That happens in about 60 percent of the cases.
In the other 40 percent of cases, the Iowa DOT doesn’t know who caused the damage and can’t make a claim. Then the agency pays for the repairs out of its general operating budget.
“We were doing really well this winter until that period of time in January,” Hart said. But because there weren’t any storms in December and February has been mild so far, the Iowa DOT expects to be able to cover these repairs and others with its regular budget.
“We're going to have more winter,” he said. “We're only in the middle of February.”
The January storms cost the state more than $10 million in labor, equipment and materials, the agency reported to lawmakers this week. These costs included:
- $4.07 million for road maintenance, including 103,894 hours that include snow plowing, snow blowing, brine making, equipment repairs and post-storm cleanup and maintenance
- $3.98 million for materials, including rock salt, sand and salt brine
- $2.3 million for equipment costs
During the storms, the Iowa DOT used more than 800 of its 902 snowplows; all 10 heavy-duty dual-engine snowblowers, numerous tractor and loader-mounted snowblowers and a number of V-plows to break through very large drifts, it reported.
Comments: (319) 339-3157; erin.jordan@thegazette.com
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