Local News

Beefed-up Colorado traction law signed, will restrict 2WDs on I-70 in the mountains most of the year

May 18, 2019

SILVERTHORNE, CO – FEBRUARY 3: The front fender of a semi-truck lays along westbound Interstate 70 after a multi-car pileup near mile marker 208 on March 3, 2019 in Silverthorne, Colorado. Summit Fire & EMS, Colorado State Patrol, and Summit County Ambulance responded to the pile up that closed westbound traffic for hours. Two bystanders who had gotten out of their cars to help render aid were struck by other cars. Both were transported by Summit County ambulance to Summit Medical Center. Icy roads, heavy snow, single digit temperatures and decreased visibility made for hazardous driving in the mountains.
*Photo by Helen H. Richardson/The Denver Post*

Colorado’s winter driving restrictions on a mountain stretch of Interstate 70 will be in full force for nine months beginning Sept. 1 under a bill signed into law Friday by Gov. Jared Polis.

The beefed-up traction law takes particular aim at drivers of two-wheel-drive passenger vehicles. Each September through May, they will face the requirement of having specialized winter tires or carrying traction devices while traveling on I-70 between Dotsero and Morrison. The old traction law had been activated only before and during actual winter weather.

House Bill 1207 also increases the minimum tread depth for tires on all vehicles — including those with four-wheel-drive — from an eighth of an inch to three-sixteenths of an inch.

Though I-70 is the only highway corridor where the increased restrictions will be in effect for nine months a year, they will apply to other corridors when the state activates the traction law for storms.