Crime Scene and Trauma Cleanup in Columbus Junction, IA

Columbus Junction is a city in Louisa County, Iowa, sitting at the confluence of the Iowa and Cedar rivers, and it is part of the Muscatine Micropolitan Statistical Area.

Columbus Junction began where two railroads crossed — the Chicago, Rock Island and Pacific built its east-west line through the area in 1858, and the Burlington, Cedar Rapids and Minnesota Railroad crossed it with a north-south line in 1870.

The town was platted on March 12, 1870, just a month after the first train crossed the new junction, and its first business was a restaurant and boarding house hauled in by rail from Muscatine.

Neighboring Columbus City, which had invested in the north-south railroad only to see both lines pass more than a mile away, was allowed to name the new town, combining its own name with the rail junction.

Columbus Junction's best-known landmark is its historic Swinging Bridge, a 262-foot-long steel cable and wood suspension footbridge built in 1922, one block south of Highway 92 near downtown.

The city's largest employer is the Tyson Foods meat processing plant just north of town on Highway 70, a plant that operated as Rath Packing from 1961 to 1982 and as IBP from 1985 before Tyson bought it in 2001.

Meatpacking growth made Columbus Junction one of Iowa's most diverse small towns — 45.4% of residents were Hispanic or Latino in the 2020 census, and the newest immigrant wave consists of refugees from the Chin State of Myanmar (Burma).

Columbus Junction had 1,830 residents in the 2020 census, living in 655 households.

The Iowa Flood of 2008 hit Columbus Junction hard, damaging 29 businesses and nonprofits, though the community has since recovered.

The Columbus Community School District is headquartered in Columbus Junction and serves Columbus City, Fredonia, Cotter, Conesville and surrounding townships, with the Wildcats as its mascot.