Route change for road near Sundance Mountain

The county commissioners kick-started the process last week of altering a public road near Sundance. South Mountain Road 281 lies towards Sundance Mountain, said County Attorney Joe Baron, and the affected landowners have already expressed their consent to change its route.

“This is not a county road, it is a public road, and there is a petition that Mr. [Trey] Hendrickson has filed, and the other landowners have signed off and consented to, to alter that,” Baron told the county commissioners.

Baron explained that it has been discovered that a septic tank sits in the right-of-way on a stretch of the road, so Hendrickson is leading the charge to move a mile-and-a-half portion of the road to the south of that landowner’s property onto Paul Stewart’s property.

Stewart is agreeable to the change, said Baron, and the new route would not change his legal access.

It’s not the first time this particular road has seen a change.

“Actually,” said Baron, “The county has altered this road at least once, maybe twice, before.”

The process to alter the public road was previously used on Spring Creek within a subdivision and is the same process as altering any other county road, said Baron. It will include advertising the proposal and a public hearing.

This time, said Baron, is likely to be easier because everyone has already consented to the change. The hope is to complete the process by spring so that Hendrickson can begin actually building the new portion of the road.

The new route will have the requisite 66-foot easement to include the usual utility easements.

The commissioners passed a motion on Tuesday to begin the process and appoint Road & Bridge Foreman Morgan Ellsbury to inspect the road as the first step. The following day, with the inspection complete, the commissioners were able to pass a resolution to announce the proposed change to the road.