River Walk opens in Iola

Boardwalk repaired

By Emily Conroy

After deliberations, planning and rebuilding, the Iola River Walk is again open to the public.

The entire walkway was shut down due to the path being heaved in locations causing a “roller coaster” type of affect to the west end, as well as boards that needed to be replaced on the east end of the walk.

The half-mile river walk was built in 2012 with donations and a grant received through the Department of Natural Resources.

Clifford Mishler, who was influential in the creation of the walk when it was being planned, said the first two years did not yield any kind of upheaval, however by year three there started to be notable damage from spring thaws.

The Community Development Authority took on the project earlier this summer, with several meetings aimed at developing a method to fix the walk and the damage caused to the wood pylons.

It was decided that a timber lock system would be used, an idea put forth by Scott Bestul, who had fixed a similar board walk with this solution.

A number of solutions were offered up to and including tearing down the existing board walk and replacing it, something that the CDA had no intentions of doing.

The next project will be the covered bridge, which will be located on the east side of the bridge, closer to Main Street.

The money for the bridge has already been donated by an anonymous donor with the anonymous donation being specifically for the covered bridge.

Missy Fenn, the Village of Iola deputy clerk and treasurer, said they are hoping to start the covered bridge project very soon, however they are happy that the walk can at least now be open and used by the public again.

The project was completed by the Iola Lions Club, with workers including Mark Doll, Glen Tetzlaff, Scott Bestul, Rollie Meyers, Dan Remington and Goob Sprangers.