{"id":21207,"date":"2020-01-31T09:37:00","date_gmt":"2020-01-31T16:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.skyhinews.com\/news\/a-treacherous-trail\/"},"modified":"2020-02-02T09:34:11","modified_gmt":"2020-02-02T16:34:11","slug":"a-treacherous-trail-county-revisits-discussions-about-reopening-rollins-pass","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/local-news\/a-treacherous-trail-county-revisits-discussions-about-reopening-rollins-pass\/","title":{"rendered":"A treacherous trail: County revisits discussions about reopening Rollins Pass"},"content":{"rendered":"
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A trestle on Rollin’s Pass shows serious erosion damage. Other structural concerns include the lack of space to expand, rockfall and weather damage.<\/strong>
Courtesy Kate and B. Travis Wright<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n

Despite the Needle\u2019s Eye Tunnel at the top of Rollins Pass being closed to traffic for 30 years, the area sees thousands of visitors annually, which has prompted conversations in Grand County about reopening the road<\/a>.<\/p>\n

However, a presentation to the Board of County Commissioners on Tuesday suggested there may be other ways to encourage recreation and stimulate the economy without reopening the route between Winter Park and Boulder.<\/p>\n

Kate and Travis Wright, historians and authors of the book \u201cRollins Pass,\u201d spoke about some of the concerns the pass is facing today, including a lack of infrastructure.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s very narrow and steep kind of all across the pass,\u201d Kate Wright explained. \u201cOn Giant\u2019s Ladder, on the east side (of the pass) \u2026 really on this stretch we just pray that we don\u2019t encounter another car or line of cars because one of the parties is going to have to back up quite a ways and there\u2019s really no room to expand (the road).\u201d<\/p>\n

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RollinsPass-shn-013120-2<\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

In its 113-year lifespan, the Needle\u2019s Eye Tunnel, which sits at the top of James Peak, has been abandoned, rediscovered and collapsed twice, most recently in 1990, when it was closed to traffic.<\/p>\n

Many sections of the Rollins Pass are narrow with little to no room for expansion and since it was closed, erosion and rockfall have changed the road, Kate noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are sections (of the pass) that are wide, could even fit four cars next to each other, but then a lot of sections where you tell your truck to \u2018suck it in,\u2019\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Currently, the portion of Rollins Pass Road in Grand County is open to recreation and vehicles, but only up to the tunnel. The portion of the road that runs through Gilpin and Boulder Counties has been closed to vehicles.<\/p>\n

The Wrights reported multiple instances of damage to the James Peak Wilderness area surrounding the tunnel, including illegal roads in the preservation area, offroading and vandalism.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt takes 100-500 years when a single car drives on tundra, for that damage to be repaired,\u201d Kate said. \u201cThe tire tracks really lead to nowhere, you can tell that people are just going out and having fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

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A truck that had driven past the wilderness sign is just one example of the many instances of vandalism, offroading and damage from irresponsible visitors.<\/strong>
Courtesy Kate and B. Travis Wright<\/em><\/figcaption><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Beyond intentional damage to the road and surrounding areas, Travis added that Colorado\u2019s population has increased significantly since the last time the pass was open to through traffic, which could mean more traffic than the one-lane road could handle.<\/p>\n

A few suggestions the Wrights made include increasing law enforcement on the pass, improving signage for recreators and visitors, encouraging responsible tourism and, perhaps most importantly, designating parts of the area as historic preservation sites, including cites with Native American heritage.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe found an artifact \u2026 (that\u2019s) the oldest human made artifact ever discovered on Rollins Pass; it\u2019s a Scottsbluff projectile point,\u201d Travis said. \u201cIt\u2019s missing its point, but there\u2019s enough of that story there to actually rewrite the history books. It\u2019s 11,000 years old, so it adds another 10% of history to the Rollins Pass story.\u201d<\/p>\n

The commissioners seemed to agree with Commissioner Merrit Linke noting the importance of historical preservation.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think all three counties would be on board with preserving history,\u201d Linke said. \u201cThat, to me, is the biggest downside of this whole thing, is we\u2019re losing history and whatever that looks like to preserve it is what we should focus on, which may or may not be opening the road.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for opening up another county thoroughfare to traffic, the Wrights suggested the commissioners look to Moffat Tunnel, potentially by expanding ski train rides or even hauling vehicles via the train.<\/p>\n

via:: Sky-Hi News<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A trestle on Rollin’s Pass shows serious erosion damage. Other structural concerns include the lack of space to expand, rockfall and weather damage.Courtesy Kate and B. Travis Wright Despite the Needle\u2019s Eye Tunnel at the top of Rollins Pass being closed to traffic for 30 years, the area sees thousands of visitors annually, which has […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-21207","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-local-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-06-17 22:32:01","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KRKY Ski Country","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21207","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21207"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21207\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21227,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21207\/revisions\/21227"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21207"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21207"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/krky\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21207"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}