WYDOT announces annual project plan

Preserving assets is the name of the game for the Wyoming Department of Transportation. District Engineer Scott Taylor said last week that the department’s ongoing financial situation has worsened considerably, which will impact planned projects for the next few years.

“For about ten years or so we’ve been telling our story we’re short about $135 million to preserve our assets,” Taylor said. Now, however, that number has grown to $354 million and the agency is concentrating on preservation.

Taylor was visiting the county with other WYDOT officials to present this year’s proposed state transportation improvement projects as part of the process of gathering public input. Over the next few years, WYDOT intends to spend an estimated $96 million in Crook County, not including district-wide projects such as chip seals and bridge rehabilitation.

The WYDOT district in which Crook County falls has more bridges than any other in Wyoming, so part of the plan is to spend $38 million over the next seven years to rehabilitate them.

Additional local projects on the list include the mill and overlay work taking place right now on I-90 west of town, which will be moving to the westbound lanes on August 15 and is expected to be ongoing next summer. The estimated cost of this is $7.2 million.

WYDOT will be bidding this month for a 2021 project to mill and overlay an 11-mile stretch from the Devils Tower Junction towards Sundance. This work is expected to take place throughout the summer of 2022 at an estimated cost of just under $5 million.

Also in 2022, a five-mile stretch of Highway 116 from Sundance to Upton (Cundy Creek section) will see preservation through mill and overlay, while a project to crack and seal I-90 from mileposts 185 to 195 will be bid and is expected to cost $23 million.

In 2023, WYDOT will turn its attention to the next section down and will crack seal I-90 from the state line back towards Sundance. This project has an estimated cost of around $4 million.

In 2024, the agency is planning pavement rehabilitation west of Sundance on I-190 from mileposts 168 to 177 towards Moorcroft at an estimated $8 million. In 2025, a $6.5 million project is planned on U.S. 14 between Moorcroft and Pine Haven to upgrade the intersection of Hwy 14 and 16 and perform mill and overlay.

Two projects are on the docket for 2027; the first is to rehabilitate a section of I-90 east of Sundance between mileposts 195 and 202 at an estimated $8 million. The second is a ten-mile stretch of mill and overlay on Hwy 212 near the Montana border.