County profile · official public datasets

Warren County, IA

239 public highway bridges tracked in the FHWA National Bridge Inventory: 42.7% rated Good, 36.8% Fair, 20.5% Poor.

239
Public bridges
42.7%
Good condition
20.5%
Poor condition

The verdict

According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory.

Warren County posts a higher-than-median Poor-condition share among rated counties in the state across mid-size county bridge inventory.

56th
of 99 on Poor share
20.5%
Poor-condition share
239
public highway bridges
1983
avg year built

Poor is an FHWA condition category from the lowest applicable component rating (4 or below), not a live crossing-safety or closure decision. Rankings cover counties with at least five public highway bridges.

Warren County Bridge Snapshot

According to the Federal Highway Administration's 2024 National Bridge Inventory, Warren County ranks #56 of 99 Iowa counties with at least 5 public highway bridges on Poor-condition share (lower share ranks better; currently 20.5%). Warren County, Iowa contains 239 public highway bridges. Roughly 42.7% are rated “Good,” 36.8% “Fair,” and 20.5% “Poor.” Poor means the lowest applicable deck, superstructure, substructure, or culvert rating is 4 or below on the 0–9 NBI scale. It is a condition category, not a live safety or closure decision.

Responsible agencies inspect covered bridges on risk-based intervals under current NBIS rules and submit inventory data to FHWA annually. The list below shows every NBI-tracked bridge in the county. Use the “Sort by” controls to change the ordering, and click any row for its reported inspection date, traffic count, and condition fields.

Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory. See methodology for full definitions.

Total bridges

239

Public highway bridges in Warren County

Good condition

42.7%

102 of 239 rated 7-9

Fair condition

36.8%

88 of 239 rated 5-6

Poor condition

20.5%

49 of 239 rated 4 or below

In-state Poor-share rank

#56 of 99

Among Iowa counties with 5+ bridges, lower share ranks better

Condition distribution

Share of 239 NBI-tracked bridges by lowest applicable component rating.

Good
42.7% (102)
Fair
36.8% (88)
Poor
20.5% (49)

Warren County's Poor-condition bridges carry 8,666 vehicle crossings a day

That is 1.9% of the county's reported daily bridge traffic on 20.5% of its bridges: Poor-condition structures carry less traffic than their share of the inventory. Each Poor bridge averages 177 crossings a day against 2,840 for a Good-condition one. A Poor rating is a condition category, not a closure or a live safety judgement; it means the lowest applicable component rating is 4 or below.

Computed over the 239 of 239 bridges in this county that report an average daily traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.

41% of Warren County's bridges have passed the 50-year mark

98 of the 239 bridges with a recorded construction year were built in 1974 or earlier. Age alone is not a defect: a well-maintained older bridge can rate Good, and 42.7% of this county's inventory does. Even so, this older cohort is the population from which future Poor ratings are drawn, which is why the age profile below matters alongside the condition split above.

Cutoff derives from the 2024 release year minus a 50-year design life. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.

One structure carries 19.8% of the county's Poor-condition bridge traffic

FM over NORTH RIVER, built 1960, carries 1,714 vehicles a day, the most of any Poor-rated structure here. The county's Poor-condition exposure is concentrated rather than evenly spread, so the 49-bridge count understates how much of the daily burden sits on a single crossing.

Share is of the 8,666 daily crossings on Poor-rated bridges that report a traffic count. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.

When Warren County's bridges were built

239 bridges with a recorded construction year, grouped by decade

bridges

What this shows Construction peaked in the 2010s, when 43 of the county's bridges still in the inventory were built, which is 18% of those with a recorded year. That cohort is now 5 to 14 years old in the 2024 inventory. Its average build year (1983) matches the Iowa average (1979).

Source FHWA National Bridge Inventory (year built) As of 2024 NBI release

How Warren County compares with Iowa's closest counties by inventory size

The 5 Iowa counties nearest Warren County in number of bridges, with their condition splits. Its 20.5% Poor share is the 4th-lowest of these 6. Its average build year of 1983 against a peer-group mean of 1979 is in line with the group.

Showing the 5 closest of 98 Iowa counties eligible for comparison.

Bridge inventory size and condition shares for Warren County and the 5 Iowa counties closest to it in inventory size
County Bridges Poor
Cherokee County 248 29%
Jackson County 246 17.1%
Hardin County 241 27.8%
Iowa County 241 19.1%
Warren County (this page) 239 20.5%
Jones County 231 4.3%

Each share is of that county's own total tracked bridges; peers are the counties with 5 or more bridges whose inventory size is closest to Warren County's. Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release.

Nationwide counties with similar inventory size or average build year

Two NBI-derived peer sets for Warren County, both outside Iowa so the neighborhoods are not the same-state size table above.

Similar inventory size

Nearest county inventories outside IA (239 bridges here).

Similar average build year

Nearest mean year-built outside IA (1983 here).

Source: FHWA National Bridge Inventory, 2024 release. Peers floor at 10 bridges so stub inventories cannot own the match.

All 239 Good 102 Fair 88 Poor 49

All bridges (239)

FM

Poor

Over: PAINTER CREEK

075252404, Warren, IA

Built 1900 Load: 4.0 t ADT: 71

LOCAL

Poor

Over: BRANCH NORTH WOLF CREEK

074220802, Warren, IA

Built 1950 Load: 4.3 t ADT: 15

FM

Poor

Over: BRANCH COAL CREEK

075220801, Warren, IA

Built 1955 Load: 5.4 t ADT: 50

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: PAINTER CREEK

075252002, Warren, IA

Built 1958 Load: 6.1 t ADT: 35

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: WOLF CREEK

074221704, Warren, IA

Built 1958 Load: 7.6 t ADT: 30

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: BRANCH OTTER CREEK

074230604, Warren, IA

Built 1970 Load: 7.9 t ADT: 30

FM

Poor

Over: NORTH RIVER

077253308, Warren, IA

Built 1949 Load: 9.9 t ADT: 89

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: FLANK CREEK

075223301, Warren, IA

Built 1965 Load: 10.7 t ADT: 30

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: BRANCH OTTER CREEK

075230802, Warren, IA

Built 1970 Load: 10.7 t ADT: 288

FM

Poor

Over: NORTH RIVER

077242002, Warren, IA

Built 1960 Load: 10.8 t ADT: 1,714

FM

Poor

Over: BUTCHER CREEK

077221904, Warren, IA

Built 1952 Load: 10.9 t ADT: 830

LOCAL

Poor

Over: MIDDLE RIVER

076251410, Warren, IA

Built 1950 Load: 11.6 t ADT: 72

LOCAL

Poor

Over: CAVITT CREEK

076240203, Warren, IA

Built 1967 Load: 12.0 t ADT: 176

LOCAL

Poor

Over: BRANCH FLANK CREEK

074221002, Warren, IA

Built 1965 Load: 14.5 t ADT: 46

FM

Poor

Over: WOLF CREEK

074221202, Warren, IA

Built 1955 Load: 14.5 t ADT: 110

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: NORTH WOLF CREEK

074231302, Warren, IA

Built 1970 Load: 15.1 t ADT: 51

LOCAL

Poor

Over: BRANCH SOUTH RIVER

076221008, Warren, IA

Built 1973 Load: 15.1 t ADT: 11

LOCAL

Poor

Over: CAVITT CREEK

076241101, Warren, IA

Built 1960 Load: 15.3 t ADT: 26

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: LIME STONE CREEK

074252904, Warren, IA

Built 1965 Load: 15.7 t ADT: 20

R35 10TH AVE

Poor

Over: NORTH RIVER

076250602, Warren, IA

Built 1962 Load: 16.3 t ADT: 260

FM

Poor

Over: NORTH RIVER

077253205, Warren, IA

Built 1960 Load: 16.3 t ADT: 60

FM

Poor

Over: S RIVER

075240504, Warren, IA

Built 1949 Load: 16.7 t ADT: 807

GRIMES ST

Poor

Over: BRANCH NORTH RIVER

076250705, Warren, IA

Built 2000 Load: 16.7 t ADT: 15

FM

Poor

Over: S RIVER

074251603, Warren, IA

Built 1950 Load: 17.6 t ADT: 100

FM

Poor

Over: CAVITT CREEK

076240204, Warren, IA

Built 1967 Load: 18.3 t ADT: 79

G-58

Poor

Over: OTTER CREEK

075232209, Warren, IA

Built 1951 Load: 18.7 t ADT: 996

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: PAINTER CREEK

075252205, Warren, IA

Built 1947 Load: 19.3 t ADT: 35

LOCAL

Poor

Over: BRANCH SQUAW CREEK

074243404, Warren, IA

Built 1960 Load: 20.2 t ADT: 51

LOCAL

Poor

Over: MIDDLE RIVER

077231204, Warren, IA

Built 1940 Load: 20.2 t ADT: 103

LOCAL

Poor

Over: BR.SOUTH RIVER

076221009, Warren, IA

Built 1940 Load: 20.9 t ADT: 11

LOCAL ROAD

Poor

Over: PAINTER CREEK

075252402, Warren, IA

Built 1952 Load: 21.1 t ADT: 11

FM

Poor

Over: STONY CREEK

074223403, Warren, IA

Built 1958 Load: 21.2 t ADT: 400

FM

Poor

Over: COTTON CREEK

074223202, Warren, IA

Built 1974 Load: 22.3 t ADT: 50

FM

Poor

Over: S RIVER

076220903, Warren, IA

Built 1966 Load: 23.3 t ADT: 50

LOCAL

Poor

Over: FELTERS BRANCH

076241805, Warren, IA

Built 1953 Load: 23.6 t ADT: 30

PIERCE ST

Poor

Over: PAINTER CREEK

075253005, Warren, IA

Built 1945 Load: 24.0 t ADT: 11

ROOSEVELT ST

Poor

Over: BR NORTH WOLF CREEK

074220703, Warren, IA

Built 1945 Load: 28.3 t ADT: 11

W MAIN ST

Poor

Over: SMALL NATURAL STREAM

074222801, Warren, IA

Built 1959 Load: 28.7 t ADT: 643

FM

Poor

Over: SHORT CREEK

076221804, Warren, IA

Built 1968 Load: 30.3 t ADT: 717

Read our methodology - how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.

Related

Browse all → | Rankings →
Data sourced from official public datasets. See our methodology for details. Retrieved and formatted by PlainBridges

Every figure on PlainBridges is rendered directly from federal source data, no number is typed in by an editor. This page draws directly on federal source data, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, or report a data error. NBI condition categories reflect the latest reported inventory record, not a live safety, closure, or travel decision.