New ‘Energy Corridor’ opens with smoother roads and, hopefully, fewer wildlife crashes 

Bumpy roads in a 53-mile stretch of rural San Juan County are smoother now that the Utah Department of Transportation has finished its “Energy Corridor” project. Also, motorists’ possibilities of hitting a horse or cattle during their commute are lower.

The updated road now features a new roundabout, new pavement, wider shoulders and a replaced bridge over McElmo Creek, aiming to serve and improve safety for residents and visitors in the Four Corners area, as well as workers from the petroleum industry who frequent the stretch.

“A lot of times these projects are based on how many people they serve, and unfortunately a lot of these places don’t grow, so if that’s the formula, they don’t get served as often,” Dustin Jansen, director of the Utah Division of Indian Affairs, said during an inauguration ceremony for the road on Wednesday. “But these roads are just as critical. And the safety of Utah citizens, no matter where they live, should be important for everyone.”

Jansen said that he, as a parent, is grateful for projects like these providing sidewalks and safer infrastructure for everyone.

An ‘Energy Corridor’ project seeks to create safer roads in southeastern Utah by 2026

“If you’re a parent that lives out here, you’re probably 30, 40 miles away at work, and so you’re not around and close by your kids when they’re going to school,” he said. “So it’s wonderful to know that at least in getting to school and making it there, they can do it in a safe way.”

Lt. Gov. Deidre Henderson shared that sentiment, saying that roads in remote areas of the state that aren’t that densely populated may be overlooked. But, they are still integral for people living in rural Utah.

“Sometimes it’s easy for policymakers to just look at numbers and to say ‘there are more people in this area, therefore we just need to spend more money in this area.’ Sometimes you have to step back and look at overall impact and choose to spend money where it maybe doesn’t make sense on paper,” Henderson said. 

It is expensive to build and maintain roads in remote areas, she said. Working on infrastructure in sovereign nations is also a challenge. But, everything came together for this project after years of planning.

The state had worked with the Navajo Nation for years to plan the corridor located along state Route 162 and state Route 262 in southeastern Utah, ultimately starting construction in 2024 with a $152 budget of federal and state funds. 

The project included more than six miles of guardrail, new fencing, over 50 cattle guards and two livestock crossings under SR-162, according to a news release from the Utah Department of Transportation. 

“That is all intended to keep the horses and livestock, whatever else, off of the road, so the drivers can be safe. They don’t have to worry about hitting a horse, which, you know, is something in the city you don’t really think about, but it’s an everyday thing down here,” said Dustin Squire, a UDOT project manager overseeing the project.

Slopes were flattened and signs and lane markings were updated. Crews also built a new roundabout at the SR-162 and SR-262 intersection in Montezuma Creek.

More than eight miles of SR-162 between Montezuma Creek and Aneth were also rebuilt as part of the project, shifting the highway away from the river and closer to the mountainside, the department said. 

“We made the road a lot safer out here, and I think that that’s probably the most important thing that we did. If people made a mistake before, they had the potential of falling off the side of the road and into a riverbed,” Squire said. “And now, if you make a mistake on the road, it’s recoverable, and you can get back on the road safely.”