Charles City Main Street Bridge Closed At Least Through July 4th Holiday Weekend

The Main Street Bridge in Charles City, closed by flooding earlier this week, will be closed past the July 4th holiday weekend.

Access to the bridge was shut down about 7 pm Sunday (06.23) night after Charles City Police reported possible visible damages to the bridge, which had been bombarded with debris from the bulging Cedar River. 

At the time, City Administrator Steve Diers said the closure of the bridge came “out of an abundance of caution.”

Diers says that full inspection won’t occur until the week of July 8th at the earliest.

In April 2022, the City Council approved conducting a feasibility study of possible replacement of the bridge, a challenge, since the structure, now almost 115-years-old, is on the National Register of Historic places.

At that time, Councilman Patrick Lumley said that the City was being proactive about the future of the bridge.

For now, the Brantingham/Highway 18 bridge is the only path within City limits for vehicles to cross from the north side of town to the south side and vice versa.

That bridge was also shut down by the flood, dissecting the City in two for the first time since the 2008 flood. Fortunately, that closure only lasted about 12 hours on Monday (06.24).