T-R PHOTOS BY MIKE DONAHEY Looking southwest, shown is the "For Sale" sign at the lot at the intersection of East State Street and North 3rd Avenue/Highway 14 in Marshalltown. The former Estel-Perrin-Avey Funeral Home and a building housing a dental and medical offices previously occupied the site. All were severely damaged in the 2018 tornado and later demolished. 

McDonald’s Corp. of Chicago, Ill., has purchased a vacant lot at the intersection of East State Street and North 3rd Avenue in Marshalltown from Allen Foundation of Waterloo (UnityPoint Health) and will build a second restaurant at the site.

The sale was confirmed by a UnityPoint Health-Waterloo spokesperson to the T-R via text message late Monday afternoon, and ownership has officially changed on the Marshall County Beacon website.

Marshalltown Mayor Mike Ladehoff also confirmed finalization of the sale to the T-R late Monday.

“We are looking forward to their (McDonald’s) addition to the north corridor of Marshalltown,” Ladehoff said.

Once completed, it will be the second McDonald’s in Marshalltown – the other is in the 3400 block of South Center Street near the intersection of Highway 14 and Highway 30.

Ladehoff, other councilors and some in the business community have been supportive of the McDonald’s efforts to build a second store when the project came to the city’s attention in August of last year.

Several local restaurant owners with businesses near the site or located downtown spoke out against the proposal at city council meetings last year and more recently via posts on social media.

One owner declined to speak on the record to the T-R. Others who expressed reservations about the project did not return telephone calls to the T-R at time of press.

Danielle Lekin – executive director of Marshalltown Central Business District (MCBD) – said the new McDonald’s was “outside” of the MCBD boundaries and would not be approached for membership.

“The second McDonald’s will have an ‘impact’ downtown,” she said.

Ladehoff was the first ward councilor when the project was made public – the same ward where the restaurant will be built.

He previously went on record saying in September of last year that he had been a first ward resident for 40 years and was looking forward to an additional restaurant.

“The only two (restaurants) remaining (in the ward) are (North End) Dairy Queen and Haley’s (now known as La Haley’s) … and they have hung in there, to their credit,” he said. “For a while, Ward 1 wasn’t worth investing in, and now it is again, and that is a good thing.”

At the same meeting, Ladehoff cited McDonald’s prices for food products as affordable and the possible creation of 30 to 40 jobs and the possibility that some residents could potentially walk to work. He also referenced an estimated $2-3 million investment by McDonald’s Corp at the site.

“The project has been straightforward,” said Assistant Housing and Community Development Director Clayton Ender. “The only ‘hiccup’ was when the Iowa Department of Transportation denied McDonald’s initial request to have vehicles turn off North Third Avenue/Iowa Highway 14 into the site. McDonald’s re-evaluated the project, and now vehicles will enter the restaurant from East State Street.”

Ender said a McDonald’s spokesperson told him the restaurant is scheduled to open “in mid-2027.” Discussions were held on rezoning the lot from Urban Core to Mixed Use last September, according to reporting by managing editor Robert Maharry of the T-R.

During that process, 4th Ward City Councilor Melisa Fonseca and then-city council candidate Marco Yepez-Gomez, who now represents the 1st Ward, spoke out passionately against allowing McDonald’s into the area, with Yepez-Gomez describing it as “downtown regression.” Despite Fonseca’s steadfast opposition, a majority of the council ultimately voted to proceed with the rezoning.

At-large Councilor Gary Thompson said Tuesday that McDonald’s decision to open a second store is good for Marshalltown.

“Never did I think I would be living within one block of a McDonald’s,” said Thompson, who resides on nearby Byron Street.

A verifiable listing of the first McDonald’s in Marshalltown was the 1972 city directory according to Dorie Tammen, assistant librarian with the Historical Society of Marshall County.

It was at 2001 S. Center St., which is currently a vacant lot. In 1977, owners built a new store at 2101 S. Center St. – currently the location of United Bank & Trust, according to Tammen.

That restaurant was later moved to the 3400 block of South Center Street. An effort to obtain additional information from the McDonald’s corporate office was unsuccessful.

The McDonald’s corporate webpage directed all media inquiries to an email address. However, the T-R did not receive a reply as of the time of press.