The Rock Island riverfront sits mostly below Lock and Dam 15, which happens to be the largest roller dam in the world.
In other words, plenty of access and amenities for the boating tourist. In that 10 miles are four marinas, numerous launch ramps, a couple of courtesy docks and four riverfront restaurants. The area stretches for approximately 10 miles upstream from Rock Island on the Illinois side, past Moline and East Moline, and on the Iowa side from Davenport to Bettendorf. Located midway on the Upper Mississippi, the Quad Cities have a combined population of about 400,000. Another oddity is that the river here does not flow north and south rather but east to west.
One is that it isn’t made up of four cities but five - Rock Island, Moline and East Moline (Ill.) and Davenport and Bettendorf (Iowa) - plus several satellite communities on both shores. There are a couple of odd things about the area on the Mississippi River called the Quad Cities.
