Pioneer Road now links Sunnyside with Utah Avenue

Pioneer Road now connects to Utah Avenue, providing a straight shot under the Pancheri overpass and south to Sunnyside Road.

If you're looking for a straight shot from the middle of Idaho Falls to Sunnyside Road, Pioneer Road is now open and there is hardly anyone using it. All you need to do is go south on Utah Avenue past Wal-Mart. You'll see a sign on the right, where Arctic Circle now is.

Until last year, Pioneer connected Pancheri Drive with Sunnyside, cutting through farmland. When the new Pancheri overpass was finished last year, however, Pioneer was routed underneath it and over to Utah Avenue.

The road is going to become a lot more important once the Idaho Falls Event Center is built and running. Since it's old blacktop, widening and repaving are likely to be in order.

The land for the event center at Snake River Landing was recommended for annexation into the city at the last Idaho Falls Falls Planning Commission meeting. The matter now goes for a vote by the City Council, and if it is approved the Idaho Falls Convention and Visitors Bureau will be able submit a plat. If the center opens as planned in 2014, Pioneer Road will be one of the main routes to it from Sunnyside Road.

By then, the new Teton Volkswagen dealership ought to be finished. Brian Tomsett of the Idaho Falls Building Department said sign contractor inquiries he's been getting indicate Panda Express is interested in building on the corner of Utah and Pioneer Road.

Bill's Bike Shop plans March 15 opening for new store

There are still plenty of bikes on the showroom floor at Bill's Bike Shop on Holmes Avenue, but within a month they will have been moved to the new store at Snake River Landing, scheduled to open March 15.

Bill's Bike Shop has set a date of March 15 for the soft opening of its new 10,000-square-foot store at Snake River Landing.

Sales associate Darrell Byerly said they will start moving the clothing and accessories this weekend to shelves that are already in place at the new store. The sign in front of the Holmes Avenue store, where Bill's has been since 1987, says the building is available for lease.

Owner Gary Wight bought the business in 2010 from Stan Murdock, whose family had owned Bill's since 1947. The new building will be a full-service bicycle shop from the ground up, with rooms for meetings and classes and a service department that will help them keep up with the massive amount of repair work they do.


When it came to finding a bike-friendly location, Snake River Landing, with its miles of paved trails and access to the Idaho Falls Greenbelt, presented itself as an ideal place. A 400-acre, master-planned community on the west bank of the Snake River between Pancheri Drive and Sunnyside Road, Snatke River Landing includes stores, offices, restaurants and homes in a development that includes parks, trails and water features.

"I wanted to be where it was bicycle friendly," Wight said.

Local banks announce promotions

There were two new promotions in the local banking sector, announced in press releases this past week.

Wells Fargo & Co. has named Grant Nelson its new business banking manager, serving the Idaho Falls and Pocatello markets.

With more than 25 years of experience at the bank, Nelson previously served as a senior business relationship manager in Burley. He also is a former manager of Wells Fargo's St. Anthony and Rexburg branches. Nelson was Southeast Idaho District manager in 2010 and was named to his most recent position as a senior business relationship manager in 2011.

He is a graduate of Utah State University in Logan, Utah, with a degree in agriculture education. He also has a master's degree in adult education from the University of Idaho.

D.L. Evans Bank has announced the appointment of Dee Darrington to investment representative for eastern Idaho. Darrington has a bachelor's degree in economics from Utah State University and an MBA from Idaho State University.

He has more than 16 years of experience in investment consulting and has been in banking for 19 years.

Study names Idaho Falls second happiest city in United States

Should we add "Have a Nice Day" to the water tower?

For a place nobody seems to know much about, Idaho Falls gets a lot of attention when it comes to stories rating places as "most liveable," "best quality of life," etc.

The latest is a story we spotted Sunday night on the U.S. News on NBCNews.com Web site, listing the happiest and most miserable cities in the United States. Wonder of wonders, among the happiest places Idaho Falls ranked second, behind Napa, Calif.

Before we go into more detail, here's a link to the page: http://usnews.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/02/22/17059015-here-are-the-happiest-saddest-and-most-miserable-us-cities,

I think that with an adequate budget for wine and regular reservations at Mustard's Grill, I could be very happy in Napa, Calif. I was surprised to see Idaho Falls beat out such places as Santa Cruz, Calif., Ashville, N.C., and Boulder, Colo., happening places that I think I could be very happy in.

The obvious question is, "How do they come up with this stuff?"

It turns out that these particular lists were based on a highly detailed survey of people on Twitter and the words they used. It released Valentine's Day by the University of Vermont, its title "The Geography of Happiness: Connecting Twitter sentiment and expression, demographics, and objective characteristics of place." It was put together by five people: Lewis Mitchell, Kameron Decker Harris, Morgan R. Frank, Peter Sheridan Dodds and Christopher M. Danforth. If you're a statistician, here's the link to the paper: http://arxiv.org/abs/1302.3299.

In a blog posting today, author Lewis Mitchell said the team plotted over 10 million geotagged tweets from 2011, looking for happy words.

"With a score of 6.25, we found the happiest city to be Napa, Calif., due to a relative abundance of such happy words as 'restaurant', 'wine', and even 'cheers', along with a lack of profanity," he wrote. "At the other end of the spectrum, we found the saddest city to be Beaumont, Texas, with a score of 5.82. In general, cities in the south tended to be less happy than those in the north, with a major contributing factor being the relative abundance of profanity used in those cities."

Idaho Falls posted a score of 6.21. Here's the chart that details all the words they were looking at to determine this score (click to enlarge):

 

So congratulations, Idaho Falls, the happiest town in the whole U.S.A. that doesn't have to resort to a bottle of fermented grape juice to find it!

Idahoan introduces new bacon-flavored mashed potatoes

Idaho Falls-based Idahoan Foods has added a new flavor to its line of flavored mashed potatoes: Bacon & Cheddar Chipotle. The newest product to come out of the Idahoan test kitchens, it comes in a four-ounce pouch that serves four. Gluten-free, it's made with Idaho potatoes and blended with cheese, chipotle pepper and bacon flavors.

For appetizer and meal concepts with the full recipes, go to www.idahoan.com/recipes. According to the company's press release, Bacon and Cheddar Chipotle Flavored Mashed Potatoes can be found at most Wal-Mart stores across the country. Wider distribution is expected later this spring.

Founded in 1960 in Lewisville, Idahoan has grown from 50 people to one of the world's leading producers of dehydrated potatoes, with seasonal employment peaks of nearly 500. In addition to its Idahoan retail brand, it manufactures food service products for restaurants, schools, cafeterias and hospitals. These include such offerings as mashed potatoes, hash browns and casseroles

Dancing With the I.F. Stars raises $15k for American Cancer Society

Jenna Schweinsberg, 2013 winner of Dancing With the Idaho Falls Stars

Congratulations to Jenna Schweinsberg of Snake River Landing, the winner Wednesday night at "Dancing With the Idaho Falls Stars."
In addition to looking fabulous and dancing divinely, Schweinsberg raised $4,645 for the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life. This is the fourth year the fund-raiser has kicked off Relay for Life, an annual event that culminates every summer with a big all-night gathering at Thunder Stadium near Bonneville High School.

As for DWTIFS's connection with Snake River Landing, it goes back to the beginning, as it was originally conceived by Michelle Ziel during the time she was marketing director there.

For the show, dancers are paired with young people from the Extreme Ballroom dance studio, who teach them a routine that lasts about a minute. Having participated myself, this year and last, let me assure you this is long enough. The other responsibility is to collect money, in advance and from the audience at the show.

The total this year was approximately $15,000. In addition to Schweinsberg, the top fund-raisers were: Sandy Moore, EIRMC, $2,816; Cindy Jones, Cargill, $2,352; and Dayne Dingman, Artcore Visual Studio, $1,707.

This was only the kickoff. If you would like to contribute to Relay for Life you can do so online at http://www.relayforlife.org/.

EIRMC hires new HR director, promotes another to head emergency services

Matt Campbell

Matt Campbell has joined Eastern Idaho Regional Medical Center as the hospital's director of human resources. He brings 11 years of human resources management experience from his tenure with Melaleuca, Inc., where he was responsible for globalization of the company's HR departments. Campbell holds a Masters of Public Administration degree from the University of Utah. An Idaho Falls native, he enjoys youth sports coaching and spending time with his family.

Jared Rickabaugh

Also at EIRMC, Jared Rickabaugh has assumed a new role as director of emergency services. A registered nurse, he has held many positions at the hospital, moving from staff nurse to clinical team leader and then to the quality department as core measures coordinator before becoming clinical manager of the emergency department. During this time, Rickabaugh earned the CPHQ professional certification in quality improvement and won the HCA Mountain Division “Peak” Award for piloting quality management systems that were eventually adopted by the entire division. In addition, Jared and his emergency department team won a statewide Qualis Award, which is given in recognition of quality improvement initiatives that significantly reduce patient wait times.

Most recently, he served as the director of quality management. He said he is excited to resume an “active duty” role with his current promotion.

A native of Iowa, he holds a Masters of Business Administration from Idaho State University and a Bachelor of Science in Nursing from Brigham Young University. He has served on the Board of Directors of United Way of Idaho Falls & Bonneville County, and is active in Boy Scouts and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.