New program will help repair farm roads, boosting Wisconsin’s rural communities
Nearly $50 million has been awarded in the first round of grants through the state’s new Agricultural Roads Improvement Program.
Rural communities across Wisconsin are receiving assistance to repair roads frequently used by farms and agricultural operations with the help of the state’s new Agricultural Roads Improvement Program.
The state Department of Transportation has awarded nearly $50 million in the first round of grants through the program, which was created in 2023 with bipartisan support. This funding will help communities with 37 road projects across the state and focuses on roads that are frequently used by farms and agricultural operations and are in need of repair or upgrades.
“Agriculture is a nearly $105 billion industry in our state, and our farmers, our producers, their families, and our rural communities have been the backbone of our state’s economy for generations,” Democratic Gov. Tony Evers said in a statement. “By helping ensure our agricultural industries can get product to market and crops or livestock from point A to point B and do so safely and efficiently, we’re continuing to support this critical part of our state’s economy and our proud agriculture tradition.”
Northwest of Eau Claire in the town of Elk Mound, hundreds of cars and trucks travel along 970th Street every day.
The commuter road skirts along the edge of the small rural town of about 900 people. It’s not only a main thoroughfare for dairy farms and grain operations in the area, but also for students, families and faculty heading to nearby schools, especially those who are traveling from Eau Claire and Chippewa Falls.
“The road has been bumpy, very much because of, I would say, the heavy traffic that’s coming through here. And when they have heavy traffic, it’s not just individual cars, but the farm equipment, the semis full of corn coming and going. That’s a lot of weight. And with our wonderful Wisconsin winters where you have freezing and thawing, it just creates more of an issue,” Elk Mound Area School District Superintendent Eric Wright told the Wisconsin Independent.
This all causes wear and tear on the school buses that use the road, and because the road is narrow and busy, traffic can occasionally get backed up.
Elk Mound will receive $413,039 from the ARIP to reconstruct the road. The scope of the project will include improving the intersection with U.S. Route 12 with a turn lane and improving the surface of the road so that there will no longer be spring weight limits for trucks that use the road. Because of this, Meyer Grain, which is located near the schools on 970th Street, will be able to deliver corn year-round, according to Elk Mound Town Chair Tony Christopherson.
“The ARIP grant will allow us to address the many deficiencies of 970th Street. Besides the local agriculture traffic of two large dairies and a hog operation, 970th Street is a primary route used by the community to get to the Elk Mound Schools, including many of the 250 open enrolled students,” Christopherson said in an email to the Wisconsin Independent. “Because the ARIP grant will fund the reconstruction to a level that we will no longer need spring weight limits, the 350 farmers from several counties that utilize Meyer Brothers Grain will be able to have their corn delivered to markets year-round for many years to come.”
The grant will also make traveling to and from the school each day safer, Wright said. “Anytime you can get some roads replaced, and you know just long term that’s a safer situation for all our kids and our community members, it is helpful,” he said.
On the other side of the state, south of Green Bay, the town of Morrison is receiving just over $2 million from the ARIP to repair Hill Road.
Many of the community’s roads are used by farms, but none of them are built to support the heavy farm equipment used today, Morrison Town Chair Gary Koomen said. Hill Road was selected for the grant program because it’s used often, and because it has a one-lane bridge that’s virtually obsolete, he said. Both the road and the bridge will be reconstructed with the funding.
“By doing that, we don’t have to, in my lifetime, we shouldn’t have to do any maintenance on it, because it’ll be built to specs that should carry the heavier traffic,” Koomen told the Wisconsin Independent.
Because the farmers in the area travel far distances between operations, Koomen said the town hopes that repairing Hill Road will make it a main route for farm traffic, hopefully shortening their trips, while also keeping the heavy farm equipment off of other roads to help preserve them.
“It’s a pretty big deal for us for the simple fact that we’re forever short of money. We always need $100 and we get $50, so we’re constantly picking where we can get the most bang for our buck. It’s a constant battle to come up with enough moneys,” he said.
This first round of funding stretches across 28 counties. Some of the other projects include nearly $3.6 million to Lincoln County for repairs to County Road YY, $411,825 to the city of Seymour for repairs to Morrow Street, and $1.8 million to the town of Fredonia for repairs to Belgium-Kohler Road.
An additional $100 million in ARIP funding is still available. Applications will be open later this summer, with awards expected to be announced by the end of the year.
