Dave Marston: Rushing water closes a highway in western Colorado

Exceptionally high runoff blew out a culvert on State Highway 133 about seven miles northeast of Paonia, which then allowed rushing water to carve a gully into the roadbed.

The rusty culvert on Highway 133 crumpled on April 29, allowing the usually meek Bear Creek to start excavating the roadway. CDOT was alerted and began monitoring the situation. Meanwhile, drivers continued to use the road until the early morning of May 3, when high water pushed the culvert down the hillside. After that, a 10-foot-wide section of highway collapsed.Other road damage in the area was discovered May 24 when fast runoff washed out the seasonal Kebler Pass Road.

CDOT put the road-rebuilding job near Paonia out for an emergency bid in early May, and Ralph L. Wadsworth Construction, with an office in Frederick, Colorado, was awarded the contract May 16. That’s when the company began engineering work on what will be a temporary bridge, said CDOT’s Thatcher. “They could have dropped in a new culvert and backfilled the roadway with gravel,” said Somerset Water Superintendent John Mlakar. As the Colorado Transportation Department will tell you, however, they have to proceed in a deliberate way.

The highway’s temporary repair — as the slide area is still considered active — involved lifting the road up 40 feet and dumping the sliding material into Muddy Creek. That fixed the problem but reduced the capacity of Paonia Reservoir, which sits downstream of the slide. It was meant to hold 20,950 acre-feet, but the reservoir today holds roughly 16,000 acre- feet.

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