More than 10,000 bicycle riders are making their way across southern Iowa this week on RAGBRAI®  – the Register’s Annual Great Bike Ride Across Iowa!    RAGBRAI will be arriving and spending the night in Ottumwa this Thursday, July 28.   Campgrounds for the riders will be in Ottumwa Park. Church and Market Street will be closed to traffic  with an entertainment zone on spanning Bridge View Center and the Beach Ottumwa, across the Market Street Bridge and up to Main Street.

Special public parking lots will be available Thursday at Quincy Place Mall and at John Deere Ottumwa Works.  Those two areas will be serviced by a shuttle bus.  You can park and ride the shuttle to the Bridge View Center through the afternoon & evening.  Buses will run until the main stage concerts are over.    RAGBRAI volunteers and the public can park in the Municipal Parking Lot by the Hydroelectric Dam. Access to the Municipal Parking Lot will be from Kitterman Avenue and along the riverfront past the Water Works.

Parking is also available in the public parking lots behind Church Street and the downtown area.

Drivers are reminded that Main Street from S. Court to Jefferson Street will be closed to traffic Thursday afternoon and evening.  Market Street south of Second will be closed all the way across the Market Street Bridge and Church Street closed from the bridge to the intersection of the Myrtle Street down ramp.   In addition, temporary four-way stops will be established on the Wapello Street Extension through Ottumwa Park where the park roads intersect.  The interior roads of Ottumwa Park will be closed to regular traffic Thursdayand Friday.