Located in Ames, Iowa, DOT is also responsible for licensing drivers and programming and planning for aviation, rail, and public transit.

[7] The planning, programming, and modal division is an umbrella group which houses the other modes of transportation.

The planning and research division is responsible for compiling statistical transportation data and assessing the financial impacts of legislation and programs upon the state.

Originally, the IHC was a part of Iowa State College where engineering dean Anson Marston was the first highway commissioner.

[20] The IHC's first task was to study Iowa's problematic roads;[21] at the time, less than 2% of which had been improved with gravel or broken stones.

Hoover and Thomas Harris MacDonald (who later became Commissioner of Public Roads for the Federal Government.

For the next ten years, the commission served as an information agency, showing county supervisors the best ways to build and construct roads.

The newly independent IHC's first task was to eliminate the price gouging that was occurring across the state.