After years of creeping along U.S. Highway 30, traffic will finally get a chance to pick up the speed.

Effective July 1, all four-lane limited access highways will be increased to 65 mph. This change is due to the federal government’s mandate in November to return speed limit regulations to state governments.

George Sisson, deputy director of the Iowa Department of Transportation’s engineering division, said the speed limit will stretch from just east of Boone to immediately west of Nevada, and signs should be in effect by the Fourth of July.

“Highway 30, now that it has an interchange at Dayton Avenue, is a limited access highway, and it is now a freeway so it can be raised to 65,” he said. “Also, because it is safe and the geometrics allow it.”

Sisson said that when the road construction expanding U.S. Highway 30 as a four-lane road to Marshalltown and beyond is finished, that section of the highway’s speed limit, most likely, also will be raised to 65 mph.

U.S. Highway 30 just south of Ames falls into State Rep. Bill Bernau’s district — the 62nd district of the Iowa House of Representatives. He voted for the bill raising the speed limit.

“Those roads are built to support speeds higher than 55 mph,” he said. “People subconsciously drive faster on that road because of the way it was built.

“I think one of the things people are concerned about is how, once they get back to the two-lane, are they going to slow down?” Bernau said.

The new law will affect approximately 125 miles of roadway in Iowa. A report by the DOT due Jan. 1, 1997, will study the impact the higher speed limit has on drivers, enforcement, and work-zone safety in construction areas.