It’s midday and there is a long line of vehicles on the Highway 149 side of the cutoff. Drivers like Steve Bonnell are queuing up for the noon opening of County Road 26.
He owns a nearby ranch and is driving a pickup truck that’s pulling an empty livestock trailer. He’s using the Lake City Cutoff to return to Mesa County to get another load of cattle.
“Well, we own a ranch here in Powderhorn and we own one on Kannah Creek down by Grand Junction,” Bonnell said. “And this is where we summer and that’s where we winter. So, we haul all our cows up every spring and back every fall. We haul about 20-30 head a day. It takes us about 10 days to get them all hauled.”
Back in April, when he first heard the news about the bridge closure, he was worried. Bonnell wasn’t sure how he would get his livestock to their summer pastures in Gunnison County. So his son called the Colorado Department of Agriculture.
“They said we are about the eightieth person that have ranches up here in the summer [to call],” he said. “And, after that bridge closed they said they won’t allow us to bring trailers or semis or anything on this road. And, they finally changed their minds. I guess they got enough pressure because we would’ve had to sold our cows.”
The bypass is a dirt road that isn't designed for heavy-duty vehicles or the volume of traffic normally seen on U.S. 50. However, it opened to some commercial vehicles and trailers in mid-May, much to the relief of area ranchers and business owners.
To restrict the amount of traffic on that road, the cutoff is not open all the time, leading to complicated journeys and long waits for many travelers.
Heather Malcolm and her son used the bypass on this day to travel from Gunnison to Montrose.
“He has a two o'clock appointment,” Malcolm said. “We’re leaving at 10:30 a.m. and we’ll be home by nine o’clock tonight. “It’s a big day for a 20-minute orthodontist appointment.”
She said she’s also frequently using the cutoff to get her son to out-of-town soccer games. Malcolm said her trips now take longer and require more planning.
“We were in Paonia last weekend for a game,” she said “We were in Rifle the weekend before [and will be] in Grand Junction this coming weekend for tournaments. It’s just an inconvenience.”
Malcolm is also a nurse at Gunnison Valley Health Hospital. She said despite the bridge closure, the hospital has a plan in place for when a patient needs to be transferred.
“I feel like our hospital has done a great job of organizing everything and making it as fluid as it can be,” she said. “It’s kind of a combination of flying people out, ground transportation with EMS. All of those things.”
The sheriff’s office in Gunnison is where the emergency operations center for the bridge closure is housed.
The operations center coordinates with local governments and emergency officials to ensure County Road 26 is accessible and in good repair.
Chuck Balke is the deputy incident commander for the state-led crisis response team.
“The ambulance service, the fire department have priority access to County Road 26,” he said. “If something happens, they can communicate with that pilot car and get everyone pulled over and allow that emergency vehicle to go by.”
He said when the dirt road is closed, maintenance is being done.
“The contractor is actually going back and continuing to make those road improvements where it needs to happen,” Balke said. “There are still areas [where] the road base is still soft. We still have to worry about the incoming weather washing parts of it away so they are constantly making repairs.”
He said the U.S. 50 bridge closure is not a federal incident.
“It’s not a natural disaster where that would trigger federal funding,” he said “It’s local. When I say local, I mean a state situation. So, the state is responsible for taking care of how it’s done and how it’s funded.”
Balke understands using the detour is a hassle but he said local and state officials are doing everything they can to address the situation.
“The patience the community has shown to us in general has been greatly appreciated,” he said. “Obviously, we aren’t going to make everyone happy. We know people have bad days where they get a little frustrated but we ask you don’t take it out on the flaggers and the people that are out there really trying to improve the situation for everyone who’s impacted.”
Back on the cutoff, lead traffic control worker Eric Trujillo said he’s there to help and answer questions.
“I’m the daytime supervisor on the Gunnison side,” Trujillo said. “Our flaggers and workers, it’s kind of a long day for them. We work 12-hour shifts day and night.”
Driver Steve Bonnell said he wants to see the road open all the time.
“When the cars get done coming this way, they’ll turn around and let the others go back that way,” he said. “I don’t mind it being a one-way because with this much traffic, it’s kind of narrow but if they get it open all the time you won’t have to sit here for a couple of hours a day.”
Transportation officials said they hope to have the bridge on U.S. 50 open to one-lane alternating traffic by the Fourth of July and have repairs completed sometime in the fall.
Until then, people can continue to expect delays and detours in the area.
KVNF reported this story in collaboration with Rocky Mountain PBS. KVNF is a member of Rocky Mountain Community Radio, a coalition of more than 20 non-commercial radio stations in Colorado, New Mexico, Utah, and Wyoming.
