MUSCATINE, Iowa — The Norbert F. Beckey Bridge that Don Hoover watched being built in 1972 shone in a new light Monday.

Hoover, 81, of Muscatine, said he came to see how the new light-emitting diode (LED) lights illuminate the bridge after he saw footage of a test lighting last week on television.

What he and his son, Jimmy Hoover, 44, of Muscatine, witnessed during the inaugural lighting Monday exceeded their expectations, they said.

“They’re beautiful,” Don Hoover said.

“This would be great coming down the river in the summer,” Jimmy Hoover said. “It’s definitely unique.”

Officials believe the Beckey bridge, which spans the Mississippi River from Muscatine to Illinois, is the only bridge lit this way on the Mississippi and may be the only such bridge in the Midwest.

The lights are mounted only on the downstream, west side of the bridge, and are capable of more than 16 million shades of color that can be programmed to change individually or in concert.

“They were cool,” Carter Williams, 10, of Muscatine, said of the light show that began by lighting the deck and truss in a green glow that transitioned to blue, then purple.

Williams, whose father worked with others at Nelson Electric to install the fixtures, said his favorite arrangement was a patriotic red, white and blue theme because “they’re the colors of the American flag.”

His brother, Jagre Williams, 5, said, “I liked the rainbow one.”

The lights were a project of six students of the 2005 class of Leadership Muscatine, a civic improvements and leadership program cosponsored by Muscatine Community College and the Greater Muscatine Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

“We just thought it was a completely different project with new technology,” said Alicia Bull, one of three community leaders in the leadership class who were involved in the project from start to finish.

Three classmates who helped initiate the project have since moved away, but Lisa Wiegel and Kathy Graham also stuck with it over three years.

“For the most part, we always stuck with it and knew there would be enough people behind it that it would become a reality,” said Bull, who works for the Greater Muscatine Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Graham said a previous Leadership Muscatine class investigated lighting the bridge similar to the Centennial Bridge between Davenport and Rock Island, Ill., but the costs were too great. She learned about the LED lights at work at Muscatine Power and Water.

But, “It would have never happened without Musco,” said Wiegel, who works at Muscatine Community College.

Musco Sports Lighting donated $250,000, which was paired with a $100,000 grant from the Iowa Department of Transportation, to pay the full product and installation costs.

“We haven’t spent any of the taxpayers’ dollars,” Graham said.

City officials from Muscatine invested time to obtain required approvals from the Iowa and Illinois departments of transportation and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Stanley Consultants of Muscatine and Musco also donated in-kind with technical assistance.

“I came down [to the riverfront] to see it and it turned out being cooler than I thought

it would be,” said Melody Moritz, 18, of Wilton. Her father, Dave Moritz, was involved in the project through his job at Stanley Consultants.

She said she liked the rainbow, but also liked the Muskies theme that featured a yellow “M” formed on the diagonal beams, while the rest of the bridge was lit in purple.

“It’s a unique feature I think we can say is our own,” Wiegel said.

The color arrangements will be controlled by Muscatine Power and Water, which will maintain and provide electricity for the high-efficiency lights.

A spokesman for MP&W said the lights will be on      365 days a year from dusk until dawn.

Reporter contact information

Jennifer Meyer: 563-262-0525

Jennifer.meyer@muscatinejournal.com