SUMMIT COUNTY, Colo. — Spending the day in places like Frisco or Keystone is a classic Colorado activity.
But what happens when the residents of such Summit County towns — and all of the people visiting them — have to get out, and fast?
Several Summit County stakeholders are working to analyze the best ways to implement emergency evacuations, specifically when it comes to wildfires.
The Summit County Comprehensive Emergency Evacuation Assessment was launched in October of 2024 and the full evaluation should be completed by the end of this year, according to Director of Emergency Management for Summit County Brian Bovaird.
"The biggest challenge that we have is infrastructure," Bovaird said. "We don't have the luxury of having multiple evacuation routes or lots of different ways to get out of the county, and so inherently, by being here, we're all putting ourselves at a greater risk to the impacts of wildfire or any other hazards that come about in the mountains."
Given the limited infrastructure, Bovaird said the goal is to use what they do have, as efficiently as possible. Wildfires pose the greatest risk to the community, which is why the assessment is based off of the natural disasters.
"We've done a lot of planning in the past, but the element that's been lacking in what we're getting here is a much more granular and technical analysis of what evacuations look like," Bovaird said. "Some of the examples of things that that we're trying to figure out are, where are the pinch points in the county? We know where they are on a normal basis, but if we have a large scale evacuation, does that change? Are there areas that we're not thinking of that are going to be pinch points for an evacuation?"
The limited roadways restrict the ability of Summit County to evacuate a large volume of people quickly, which is why Bovaird said the mountain community relies on ordering evacuations more than urban areas.
"One of the biggest challenges that every organization and agency up here faces is that we have a census population of around 30,000 people, but on any given day, especially during peak visitation times, we might have upwards of 200,000 people in the county," Bovaird explained. "A big component of this evaluation also is communication. How do we communicate internally and externally during these times so that we can make the operations related to evacuation as efficient as possible? And so, how do we notify all of the different segments of people that we know are in our community at any given time?"
Anyone who lives in Summit County or who visits the area is invited to participate in a 15-minute survey, which aims to gauge "experiences about past and future wildfires, as well as any suggestions for the plan."
The survey will remain open until May 15, 2025, and one survey response per household is requested.
"This is not just for Summit County residents," Bovaird said about the survey. "We're looking for anybody who comes up to Summit County and spends time, whether it's for the day, whether it's for a weekend once a year, or whether you come up here every weekend, you have really valuable information that we're hoping you'll share with us."
Bovaird said this project is happening now because of research conducted, following recent western wildfires.
"The silver lining of all of these megafires recently, if you pick any state in the Mountain West, five of their largest wildfires have likely occurred within the last five to 10 years," Bovaird said. "With that, we're getting a lot of data, and we're getting a lot of real time ground truths from those incidents that we're now able to coalesce and make a much more accurate picture of what evacuations or those same scenarios would look like here in Summit County. And also the research, the technology and the data related to what we're looking to, you know, the granular level we're looking to get to, it really hasn't existed before."
The project is expected to be completed by the end of 2025, and then Bovaird said the real work begins.
"Are there improvements to the existing infrastructure that we have that in the future?" Bovaird asked. "Such as adding an additional lane in certain places, or taking an unimproved road and maybe building that up a little bit and making it able to withstand evacuation traffic to increase what we do have."
Once the ability to model emergency wildfire scenarios is completed, the lessons learned can be applied to varying hazards within Summit County according to Bovaird.
"We want it to be as as fast as possible while still being as safe as possible," Bovaird said.
Bovaird said Summit County — the towns, and ski areas are paying for the project — through a contract with Kittelson & Associates, costing $350,000. The Tuolumne County Transportation Council in California also worked with Kittelson & Associates to gain a better understanding of wildfire risk and how to best employ their emergency strategies.
More than 20 community stakeholders are involved in this project, including the American Red Cross, Arapahoe Basin Ski Area, Breck Free Ride, Breckenridge Ski Resort, Colorado Department of Transportation, Colorado State Patrol, Copper Mountain Ski Resort, I-70 Coalition, Keystone Ski Resort, Red, White & Blue Fire Protection District, Summit County Government, Summit County Sheriff’s Office, Summit Fire and EMS, Town of Blue River, Town of Breckenridge, Town of Dillon, Town of Frisco, Town of Keystone, Town of Silverthorne, U.S. Forest Service, and Colorado State University Extension – Wildfire Council.
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