The Sand Creek Road in the Snowy Range Mountains is hugely popular with Albany County residents, and it’s getting plowed this winter.
But not for the public.
Instead, the road, which takes off from the Snowy Range Scenic Highway (aka Wyoming Highway 130) above Centennial, is being kept open exclusively for logging trucks.
Loggers are allowed in for a U.S. Forest Service timber sale in the area, the Medicine Bow-Routt National Forest reports.
Some residents say they’re fine with timber companies taking over the road for the winter even if they can’t get on it.
They’re OK, that is, so long as other people don’t try to go barreling up it in their personal vehicles, or come flying down the highway from the Snowy Range Ski Area and slam into logging trucks.
Don’t Go There
The Sand Creek Road is a popular route to access hiking, camping, firewood cutting, hunting and other activities in the heart of the Snowy Range.
It can take travelers all the way over the mountains, coming out on the north end of the range.
The Forest Service typically doesn’t plow it in winter, and waiting for the snow to melt off in the spring has become a seasonal ritual for Albany County, as well as outdoor enthusiasts from far and wide.
However, the Forest Service wants people to know that seeing the road plowed this winter isn’t an invitation to start whooping for joy and go speeding up it.
“The forest roads are seasonally closed to wheeled, motorized travel; however, the Laramie Ranger District would like to emphasize that public vehicles are not allowed on the plowed roads, except those involved in the timber sale,” the Forest Service said in a statement.
"On-the-ground signage will reflect that restriction. Timber operations can occur daily except for federal holidays,” the statement adds. “Logging trucks and snow removal equipment are operating within approximately 1.5 miles on the south end of Forest Road 101, also known as Sand Lake Road, as well as the entirety of Forest Road 329.
It wouldn’t be the first time travel has been restricted for winter logging in the Snowies.
Snowmobile trails on the north end of the Snowy Range were shut down for logging during the winter of 2023-2024
Logging Sorely Needed
Some locals say they enthusiastically welcome the logging, particularly since much of the Snowy Range is dominated by “ghost forests.”
Those are massive stands of dead trees killed by a devastating pine beetle epidemic in the 2000s and 2010s.
Dead timber also fed the massive Mullen wildfire in 2020, said Cowboy State Daily meteorologist Don Day, a Cheyenne resident who owns a cabin in the Fox Park area of the Snowies.
He said his property, and much of the surrounding area, still shows the scars of the fire, and he’d hate to see the Snowy Range blow up again.
Logging could help prevent that, Day said.
“It’s something we’re kind of used to. For several winters, there have been similar closures for logging in Fox Park,” he said.
Day added that he's concerned that some people might ignore the Forest Service signs and try to drive up the Sand Creek Road and get stuck, and possibly get stranded far up in the mountains.
Just Stay Off The Road
Albany County Commission Chairwoman Terri Jones said she also welcomes the logging. As she sees it, the Forest Service has the right to plow the road and not allow the public to use it.
“In essence, that road belongs to the Forest Service and they can do whatever they want to do with it,” she said.
Like Day, she hopes people don’t get stupid and try driving up the Sand Creek Road just because they think they can.
“I could see where that would be a terrible mess, where people would get up there and get stuck in the middle of the road, and then the loggers can’t get down, and tempers would flare,” she said.
Tom Burkett, a member of Friends of the Laramie Rail Trail, agrees that “people could try getting up there (on the road), and then end up who-knows-where.”
Blown-over timber has been blocking the Rail Trail and other trails in the Snowy Range, he said.
So it’s good to know that some of the timber is being cleared out, particularly in the wake of howling winds that recently ripped across Wyoming.
Skiers, Snowmobilers Beware
Outdoorsman Randy Svalina of Laramie said he supports logging as a means of fire prevention and improving forest health — even if it means keeping the public off the Sand Lake Road for the time being.
”If winter logging can perpetuate jobs for local industry while simultaneously generating useful products that also happen to make for a healthier forest in an area that is ripe for a major fire, then I am all for it,” he said. "Regrowth will benefit the wildlife population without ravaging the Snowy's with yet another major fire."
He is concerned about snowmobile and skier traffic coming and going to the Snowy Range Ski area and trailheads up the highway from the Sand Lake Road turnoff.
“Ski area traffic is heavy when the lifts close, scores of tired people that aren't paying attention fly down that hill coming to the Sand Lake Road entrance,” he said. “Likewise, snowmobile trailers leaving the Green Rock parking area will hit their first straightaway coming steeply down to where the logging trucks will be entering the highway."
He'd like to see “extremely visible, flashing signage indicating truck traffic entering the road.”
“In a nutshell, let’s put loggers to work and keep everyone safe,” he said.
Mark Heinz can be reached at mark@cowboystatedaily.com.
