Driftless Area Scenic Byway
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DRIFTLESS AREA SCENIC BYWAY © 2012 Lora Friest © 2012 Brad Crawford Fall/Winter 2012 Newsletter Inside This Issue: Driftless Area Interpretive Center Point of Interest ............................... Pg 1,2 The Driftless Area Scenic Byway Board was says the professional grant writing skills of the Driftless Area Interpretive Center ....... Pg 1,3 excited to learn that the Allamakee County staff at the RC&D Office played a vital role in Scenic Byway Poker Run ..................... Pg 2 Conservation Board (ACCB) was notified securing the funding. LiDAR Project ..................................... Pg 2 Thursday, August 2 that it had been awarded The grant will help fund a three-level build- Byways of Iowa Website ...................... Pg 4 a National Scenic Byway Grant in the amount ing with views of the Mississippi River from Calendar of Events ............................. Pg 4 of $1,361,400 for the development of the both inside and outside the building. The loca- Driftless Area Education and Visitor Center be- tion of the proposed Driftless Area Education ing planned at the Columbus property south and Visitor Center is on the historic Columbus of Lansing. property owned by Allamakee County and Point of Interest The ACCB, with the assistance of the located at 1978 Great River Road, south of Northeast Iowa Resource Conservation and Lansing. There are over 100 sights and locations of in- Development (RC&D) Office in Postville and Janett further states that the location of the terest along the Driftless Area Scenic Byway. the support of the Allamakee County Board of property offers excellent opportunities for grant Each newsletter will give you an insight into Supervisors, was able to secure the discretion- funding due to it being located on three Na- a unique opportunity one can experience ary grant funding through the National Scenic tional Byway designations, including The Mis- along the byway. Byways Program (NSBP) sponsored by the U.S. sissippi River Great River Road, The Mississippi Department of Transportation’s Federal High- River Trail, and the Driftless Area Scenic By- WW Homestead Dairy way Administration. ACCB Director Jim Janett Continued on Page 3 © 2012 Jared Nielsen If you haven’t made a trip to the newly opened WW Homestead Dairy, be sure to stop in the next time you are traveling the by- way for an udderly good time. Located in the town of Waukon, this creamery was born in 2011 when two local families decided they would make homegrown dairy products in © 2012 Jared Nielsen Allamakee County a reality once again. View from the Columbus property near Lansing looking north upriver. An education and visitor center being planned for the property was Continued on Page 2 recently awarded a $1.3 million grant through the National Scenic Byways Program. Submitted photo by Jared Nielsen. 2 Point of Interest Scenic Byway Poker Run A year after opening its doors, WW Home- The Driftless Area Scenic Byway Poker Run stead Dairy continues to offer their customers presented by Waukon Harley Davidson and a full dairy product line that features non- the DASB Board of Directors was held on Sat- homogenized pasteurized milk, butter, fresh urday, September 29th to help raise financial cheese curds, and over 30 different flavors support to develop marketing materials for of premium ice cream. For a special treat, the Driftless Area Scenic Byway. stop in on Tuesday or Friday to experience Poker run participants enjoyed an 85-mile fresh made cheese curds, or swing by on route along two of the most scenic byways © 2012 Jessica Rilling Wednesday to try recently made homestyle in Iowa, the Driftless Area Sce- ice cream. nic Byway and the Great River Road. Riders were treated to Distance Between Stops Start to Stop 1 24 miles beautiful colors and spectacu- Stop 1 to Stop 2 15miles DRIFTLESS AREA Stop 2 Stop 3 lar fall views while making their to 12 miles waySCENIC to stops BYWAY at the Harpers Fer- Stop 3 to Finish 34 miles ry Boat landing, Mount Hosmer City Park and The City Market POKERin New Albin. RUN Registered par- ticipants were encouraged to Saturday, September 29th collectRegistration signatures 9AM-10AM at each stop alongLast outthe at way 10AM for a chance to win door prizes and awards for Start & Finish at Waukon Harley-Davidson Entry:the $15 highest per rider/passenger and lowest poker hand.Last in at 3:30PM Snacks & Door Prizes at Finish Prizes will beThe awarded Driftless to high Area & low Scenic poker handsByway Curious about how the dairy products are Board of Directors would like to produced? Guided processing-plant toursProceeds thankwill go toWaukon-Harley help develop the byway David- are available Monday-Friday to take youFor moreson, information, Schulte’s call BBQ 563-568-3471 & Catering through the milk processing plant and ex- and The Waukon Greenhouse plain how the dairy turns its milk into fresh, ALLfor BIKES all of& CARS their WELCOME help and support high quality dairy products. If you preferEnjoy tofall foliagein along making Iowa’s this most event scenic astate success. byway! learn on your own, customers are welcome to do a self-guided tour through the viewing hall at any time. Located in the back of the See photos, stay informed about upcoming projects and share your personal stories dairy, the viewing hall will allow you to see along the byway. Fund us at “Driftless Area Scenic Byway Experience.” the hard work, effort and quality that goes into making the milk, ice cream, cheese and butter. LiDAR Project map. Throughout 2006 and 2007 LiDAR data was collected for the entire state of Iowa. Have you ever heard of LiDAR? LiDAR LiDAR is useful for planning efforts in a va- stands for Light Detection and Ranging. This riety of fields including transportation, risk as- new technology uses lasers to scan the surface sessment, education and research. The Iowa’s of the earth from an aircraft. The length of time Byways program will be utilizing LiDAR to de- it takes light from the laser to reach Earth’s sur- termine what can be seen from each byway. face and be returned is measured in distance Northeast Iowa RC&D will be using LiDAR and and results in an extremely accurate elevation other data to develop “viewshed” maps for each byway, which will essentially display what can be seen from any given point along the roadway. The overall goal of this project is to help each byway board gain an understanding of exactly what lies within sight of their byway. This in turn will help them make wise planning decisions that will protect and preserve the scenic quali- To schedule a guided tour or receive more ties of their byway. Iowa DNR manages the information, contact WW Homestead Dairy LiDAR data for the state and more information at 563-568-4950 or visit their retail store lo- can be found at http://www.iowadnr.gov/En- cated at 850 Rossville Road, Waukon. vironment/MappingGIS/LiDAR.aspx. 3 Driftless Area Interpretive Center way. It is intended that the proposed develop- ment of the property will provide a convenient and beneficial location to serve the public trav- eling into Allamakee County from Minnesota and Wisconsin, as well as the residents of Al- lamakee County. According to ACCB information, the con- cept of developing a Driftless Area Education and Visitor Center was first presented to the Allamakee County Conservation Board in the early 1990s. For many years trailer rental units occupied the County-owned property. The Allamakee County Board of Supervisors had continual input from the public regarding re- moving the trailer rental units from the proper- ty and developing the property for public use. The decision was made by the Board of Supervisors over ten years ago to provide notice to tenants of the rental units that the property was going to be cleared of the rental units. Once the trailers were removed from the Project Site Plan property, the cleanup and development ef- forts began with the assistance of Allamakee County Secondary Roads and the Conserva- tion Board. The Board of Supervisors turned to the Conservation Board the wide variety of through which the grant funding for the edu- over the management and development plan- opportunities that were available to the Conser- cation and visitors center was received, there ning of the property to the Conservation Board vation Board for grants due to the property be- were 261 grant applications in the amount of in 2007. The Conservation Board considered ing located on designated byways. $111,843,630, with only 125 of those being a number of different usages of the property Application for the grant funds were encour- awarded in the total amount of $37,054,987. ranging from a shelter house to an education aged by the Federal Highway Administration “The demand for these funds demonstrates a and visitor center. Based on input from the (FHWA) from states, cities, tribal governments clear need for increased infrastructure invest- public, the Conservation Board made the de- and local planning organizations. Nearly 1,500 ment,” said Federal Highway Administrator cision to pursue the design and funding of an requests poured in from every state, Puerto Victor Mendez. “The President asked us to re- education and visitor center. Rico and Washington, D.C. totaling approxi- build America - we have work to be done and The Conservation Board applied for and mately $2.5 billion in grant requests through Americans ready to do the work.” received two separate grants from the Allama- 12 different funding programs. Grant funding The National Scenic Byways Program kee County Community Foundation totaling was made available through enactment of the (NSBP) recognizes roads having outstanding $12,000 for planning and design options on Surface Transportation Extension Act of 2012, scenic, historic, cultural, natural, recreational the property.