$21 million Vail Pass Rest Area project now complete

The Colorado Department of Transportation unveiled the newly reconstructed Vail Pass Rest Area on Tuesday, allowing travelers to carry on a more than 6,000 year-old tradition.

The $21 million project has been in construction since May of 2022 and adds 175 new parking spaces and 12 new restrooms for Vail Pass’s approximately 500,000 visitors each year.

CDOT Executive Director Shoshana Lew was on hand to help cut the ribbon on the new facility on Tuesday, along with dozens of stakeholders who made the project a reality.

“Vail Pass is more than just a road, it’s a gateway to our mountain communities, our tourism economy and the Colorado lifestyle,” Lew said. “This new rest area makes travel safer and more welcoming for everyone who comes through our state, from truckers to families on vacation.”

CDOT Maintenance and Operations Director Shawn Smith said it was the largest turnout he’s ever seen at a ribbon-cutting.

“To have this many stakeholders at a ribbon-cutting ceremony is completely phenomenal,” he said.

Smith said the project was difficult to complete due to the short construction season at the Alpine location. An original completion date targeted October of 2023, but weather and other complications delayed completion of the project.

“At over 10,000 feet, Vail Pass is one of the most challenging and important corridors in Colorado,” Smith said.

But those challenging conditions are also what made it such an important project, Smith said.

“Our teams work year-round in some of the toughest conditions in the state, and this new facility will allow us to respond to various hazards on the roadway faster and more efficiently,” he said.

Hope Wright, a real estate asset manager with CDOT, was credited with seeing the project through.

Wright said that to add the extra restroom facilities, a water treatment plant and wastewater treatment plant had to be constructed to service the rest area. The facility pulls water from nearby West Tenmile Creek, treats it and stores it in a 10,000-gallon tank beneath the facility.

“That should give us capacity for 50 years of growth,” she said.

Annual usage of the facilities at Vail Pass is expected to increase by 15% over the next 15 years, Wright said.

Wright credited CDOT’s team of archaeologists and historians for ensuring that the project protected nearby archaeological resources. Vail Pass has been used as a temporary camping and hunting site by Native Indigenous travelers dating back to between 6400 and 5800 BCE, and the evidence of those camps was discovered during the construction of the original Vail Pass rest area during the late 1970s and early 1980s.

Greg Wolff, a senior staff archaeologist with CDOT, consulted with native tribes and the Forest Service to preserve the cultural resources in the area.

“For more than 6,000 years, people have been coming up and over Vail Pass to get from the plains of the Front Range, over the divide and on to the Western Slope,” he said. “This was the path of easiest transit, and they would stop here where this rest area is today and camp on these hilltops.”