Blue Sky Highway improvement project work resumes near Ethete

Spring roadway improvements have started on the $14.63 million highway improvement project on Wyoming 132 between Ethete and U.S. 287.

Prime contractor High Country Construction, Inc., of Lander has mobilized equipment and crews to work on irrigation structures and installing culverts through the new alignment of the new roadway.

"Work will impact traffic traveling through the project, and reduced speed limits and flagging operations will be in place throughout the remainder of the project," according to Wyoming Department of Transportation Project Engineer Brian Martin of Lander. "Dirt work operations will pick up over the next couple of weeks as temperatures warm and the days get longer."

Martin said more than six miles of new project right-of-way fencing was built through the winter work season, "and new irrigation lines and diversion boxes are nearing completion. The existing asphalt roadway will be milled to a gravel base in the next two months and will remain unpaved until crushed gravel base grade is finished and asphalt paving operations begin this summer."

Improvements on the Blue Sky highway improvement project, prior to the contract completion date of Oct. 31, 2019, include grading, draining, milling asphalt pavement, placing gravel pit run and crushed gravel, asphalt paving, chip sealing, electrical work and other work on seven miles of Wyoming 132 north of Lander.

Real-time project updates on the Blue Sky Highway (WY132) project are available at #abetterbluesky.

For information about WYDOT's work, contact WYDOT public relations specialist Cody Beers at (307) 431-1803.