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Point 8: Commerce accommodation Plan

Commercial traffic and access to businesses along the
Byway route can be, and is, accommodated while ensuring
the safety of sightseers in recreational vehicles, as well
as bicyclists and pedestrians. This section provides a plan
to accommodate commerce while maintaining a safe and
efficient level of highway service, including convenient user
facilities�

Much of the Iowa Valley Scenic Byway is located in open,
rural country. Significant commercial and business traffic
is located only in the three largest towns, Belle Plaine,
Marengo, and Tama, and in the individual Amana Colony
villages. These villages, long a major tourist attraction, are
designed to safely accommodate tourists and their vehicles,
with ample off-street parking, wide sidewalks, and well-
marked pedestrian cross walks. In addition, the most heavily
trafficked roads, including the IVSB, runs adjacent to, rather
than through, the villages.

Commercial and business traffic on the Byway itself is
heaviest in Belle Plaine, Tama, and to a lesser extent
Marengo. Some historic Byway attractions, such as Preston’s
Station in Belle Plaine, are directly on busy streets, to the
extent that visitors are discouraged from stopping. For the
most part, however, the major cultural and historical locations
that lend the Byway its significance are not situated in the
commercial districts of the larger towns, and therefore the
Byway is relatively safe from the perspective of safe access
by visitors to Byway sites of interest and consumer facilities.