Nampa just landed nearly $43 million to carry Robinson Road over the Union Pacific tracks, with construction still about four years out. Civic & Policy reads the award, the local 20 percent, and why a crossing blocked by trains made the city's list.
The Market has the other Nampa question — 487 Toll Brothers homes next to Columbia High, heard Monday night. The Bench has Boise State's one-point Halloween night, and Drive-By History meets the two German immigrants behind a 1902 downtown corner.
Nampa lands $43M to end a blocked rail crossing
Nampa has been selected for up to $42.98 million in federal money to stop drivers from sitting at a railroad crossing on Robinson Road. The city announced it in a news release posted October 30, and it calls the award the largest transportation grant in its history. The Federal Railroad Administration is the funding agency. The release doesn't name the specific program, so take the round number and leave the acronym soup for later.
The case the city makes holds up before anyone frames it. Trains frequently block the crossing at Greenhurst Road, which delays drivers and complicates emergency response, and Nampa projects traffic on Robinson between Cruse Lane and Greenhurst to roughly triple by 2050, from 5,500 vehicles a day to 16,200. "As Nampa continues to grow, improving connections across our transportation network is essential for residents, emergency responders and businesses that rely on these routes every day," said Crystal Craig, the city's transportation director, in the release. That's the strongest version of the pitch, and it's not a stretch.
The money covers final design, right-of-way, and construction of a bridge that carries Robinson over the Union Pacific tracks, so cars travel above the crossing instead of waiting it out. The whole project runs $53.7 million. The City of Nampa and Nampa Highway District No. 1 provide the other 20 percent as the non-federal match. Mayor Darl Bruner said the grant "will help us eliminate a dangerous crossing that is often blocked by trains and make travel safer and smoother for everyone." Nick Lehman directs the highway district, the city's partner on that match.
The honest part is the calendar. Construction is expected to start in early 2030 and take up to three years, so nobody should look for cones next spring. Design details and chances for public input are promised as the project moves, at nampa.info/robinsonoverpass. The city last took feedback on alternatives in summer 2025, so the next window hasn't opened yet.
If you drive Greenhurst and idle on freight, the relief is years out, and the thing to watch is that project page and the input windows the city says are coming. For the rest of the valley, this is the second big federal transportation award to Nampa this year, after $23 million in July for the Northside Corridor — the template for how a fast-growing city pays for roads it can't afford alone. Two sentences for the group chat: Nampa was picked for up to $43 million for a Robinson Road overpass, with a 20 percent local match from the city and the highway district. The first shovel is still about four years away.
487 Toll Brothers homes meet the Nampa council
487 single-family homes on about 138 acres — that's a small town's worth of roofs Toll Brothers wants annexed at Amity Avenue and Happy Valley Road, just east of Columbia High School. The City Council held its public hearing Monday night, Nov. 2.
The plan, called Braeburn Creek, would zone the land RS4, RS6 and RS7 — single-family residential — and build out in 14 phases over about seven years, under case numbers ANN-00371-2026 and SPP-00184-2026. Per BoiseDev, citing the application, the site sits mostly vacant now except for that house and the outbuildings, all of which would come down. Toll Brothers would bring its Arbor, Magnolia and Brookside collections, plus a clubhouse, a pool, two sports courts and a playground.
Traffic is where the heat lands out here, same as it does on every southeast Nampa map. BoiseDev reports Toll Brothers told the city it's willing to help convert the single-lane roundabout at Amity and Happy Valley into a dual-lane one. The Nampa Planning and Zoning Commission recommended approval in September. That clears the commission. It doesn't decide anything; the council does.
Monday's outcome hadn't been posted by Tuesday morning, and minutes and coverage weren't up yet. So you read this one against February. On Feb. 17, the council voted 4-2 against annexing Orchard Acres, a 276-acre plan of about 1,400 homes between Happy Valley and Robinson roads, after residents and members cited traffic on narrow rural roads, density and emergency response. P&Z had recommended denial on that one.
That February night tells you how this council has weighed growth out here. “I just cannot go against what all of you who live in this area have said,” council member Debbie Skaug said, per BoiseDev, voting no. Farmer Kathy Henrickson, whose land was the Orchard Acres site, testified too: “Pesticide drift does not belong on barbecue meat.” Braeburn Creek is smaller, came recommended, and offered the roundabout fix, which is three ways it parts from Orchard Acres. Whether that was enough is in Monday's record, once it posts. Watched the hearing? Reply with the vote count if you've got it.
The casual Boisean who checked the score at halftime and went to bed missed the whole game. Boise State led Texas State 28-3 at The Blue on Halloween night, the Broncos' first Pac-12 After Dark. Then they gave up 36 straight points. They trailed 39-28 in the fourth. They walked off 46-45 anyway. If you left at the half, the real game started after you did.
The collapse had an order to it. Texas State hit a 67-yard touchdown pass, scored off a Boise State fumble and ran in the two-point try, watched quarterback Brad Jackson take one 35 yards himself, added a 44-yarder, and then Jayden Bradley picked off Maddux Madsen and went 20 yards the other way. Madsen got hurt early in the fourth. Before that he'd gone 24 of 33 for 236 yards, a touchdown pass, and two scores on the ground.
Enter Max Cutforth, the backup, 8 of 13 for 131 yards and three touchdown passes. Every one went to freshman Rasean Jones or Akeem Wright. Mana Tuioti's first career interception, a 15-yard return to the Texas State 11, set up Jones's second. After Texas State's 72-yard go-ahead strike, Cutforth hit Jones for 44 on the first play of the answer, then found Wright from 18 with 2:41 left. Jaden Mickey broke up the fourth-down pass to end it. That's your game.
Jones caught nine for 117 and three scores, all career highs — the second Boise State freshman in the FBS era to catch three in a game, after Austin Pettis against Idaho in 2007. Wright added 116, the first time since 2019 two Broncos cleared 100. Dylan Riley ran for 86 and reached 1,049 on the year, the 10th Bronco over 1,000 in back-to-back seasons. It was the 300th FBS win and the seventh straight. They're 7-1, 4-0 in the Pac-12, No. 20 in the AP poll.
Kellen Moore, now head coach of the New Orleans Saints, was back for his statue unveiling and raised the Blue Chaos flag before kickoff. On Madsen, coach Spencer Danielson told the Idaho Statesman Monday it's “really good to hear that it's not going to be long term,” and that “we have full trust in Max, and he knows he can do it.” Madsen is day-to-day. Cutforth takes the first-team reps until further notice. Broncos play at Colorado State on Saturday at 4 p.m. on USA Sports.
Two German immigrants put their names on this corner in 1902
See that round brick turret where Idaho Street meets Capitol Boulevard? Event venue up top, a basement pub down below. That's the Adelmann Building. It carries the names of two German immigrants who bet on Boise more than a hundred years ago, and the bet held.
Richard C. Adelmann came from New York in 1872, after the Union Army. He and his sons went into mining and business, including the Acme Plumbing and Heating Company. Fred C. Wills came up from Montana around 1900. The census that year called him a “stock raiser.” He partnered with the Adelmanns on mining claims, put money into Acme, and later ran a grocery. Both names went on the building: the Wills-Adelmann Block.
They built in the right year. The Idaho Statesman called 1902 “a season of building and real estate prosperity without parallel,” and pegged new Boise construction that year at over a million dollars. Architect William S. Campbell drew two adjoining one-story shops that could take a second floor someday. Someday came. Today it stands two stories tall in light pressed brick on both street faces, with bay windows up top and that turret on the southwest corner.
The first tenants tell you what downtown was: Wills's grocery and the Acme plumbing company on the ground floor, the Elks lodge upstairs. Decades on came Fong's Tea Garden, a well-known Chinese restaurant. An Eagle firm, Alturas Capital, bought the roughly 17,000-square-foot building in 2017.
For years that corner turret wore Chinese characters for Fong's Tea Garden. BoiseDev reported they came off in the 1990s, after Fong's closed.
📍 622 W. Idaho St., at Idaho and Capitol. The event venue, The Adelmann, seats up to 220 by booking. Downstairs is Voodoo Cellar, a New Orleans-themed pub at 200 N. Capitol Blvd. Take the stairwell at the southeast corner of Idaho and Capitol, look for the backlit sign, 21 and over, open 5 to midnight tonight. Stand on the corner and look up at the turret. Then go down the stairs for a drink under a building that opened with a grocery, a plumbing company and the Elks. That's the one you tell at dinner.
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