Crews laying fiber-optic lines on the east side of Wolf Creek Pass are bringing the region closer to better internet connectivity.

Widespread phone and internet outages in June 2016 that affected 911 centers and regular customers, demonstrated the region’s need for more fiber optic lines to major internet hubs outside the area.

“We, in this region, have a real lack of redundancy and Wolf Creek is one of the only ways out of the region,” Southwest Colorado Council of Governments Miriam Gillow-Wiles said.

Partnerships between the Colorado Department of Transportation, private companies, electric co-ops and others could create a fiber link over the pass.

It’s been one of CDOT’s goals for a while, but funding wasn’t available until recently, said Kevin Walters, a utility engineer for the agency.

CDOT and San Luis Valley Rural Electric Cooperation are working together on the project on the east side of Wolf Creek pass that will connect Wolf Creek Ski with fiber.

In April, CDOT started installing fiber across a 16 mile stretch from the east side of South Fork to the tunnel on the east side of Wolf Creek Pass.

San Luis Valley Rural Electric Cooperation is burying a mile and a quarter of fiber line and power lines alongside CDOT infrastructure as part of a project to bring fiber to the Wolf Creek Ski Area and the top of the pass.

The construction is expected to cost about $4.5 million and the San Luis Valley Rural Electric Cooperative is paying for about $500,000, Walters said.

The fiber will replace a microwave link connection that CDOT relies on to transmit road data, like temperature, from the tunnel, said Julie Constan, traffic program engineer.

“By having fiber in the ground we are improving our communication reliability,” she said.

The fiber will also help the agency monitor the ventilation system in the tunnel and cameras.

This year, the San Luis Valley Co-op expects to complete it’s part of the project to bring fiber to Wolf Creek Ski Area, said CEO Loren Howard. The co-op is building fiber to all the customers who are interested through out the San Luis Valley, he said.

As part of the project, the co-op is also burying power lines, which will bypass some remote power lines susceptible to outages.

Wolf Creek’s chief executive Davey Pitcher and his wife Roseanne Pitcher, vice president of marketing and sales, are looking forward to more reliable internet and power from the San Luis Valley electric co-op.

Power lines at the resort tend to go down during storms and leave the resort to rely on its generators. This year the ski area had power outages four days before Christmas and four days right before Spring Break, he said.

“It always seemed it was right at Christmas time or during a peak holiday that we had the trouble,” Davey Pitcher said.

It’s a problem the resort has been dealing with for decades.

They expect the buried power lines will bypass some remote lines susceptible to outages because of trees and wind, Roseann Pitcher said.

The microwave internet connection the ski area relies on tends to be unreliable when the area is crowded, and it is a particular problem for the area’s credit card machines, Roseanne Pitcher said.

For regional internet connectivity in that area the next step is fiber on the west side of Wolf Creek pass.

To build that link, CDOT plans to apply for a federal grant through the Advanced Transportation and Congestion Management Technologies Deployment program, Constan said.

It is unknown how exactly how much the project would cost, but the grant likely would only cover half of the construction, she said.

The agency also doesn’t know if the fiber would be built from Pagosa east to Wolf Creek or over the top of the pass, Walters said.

However, there are already several parters who are interested in working with CDOT on the project that would lease out fiber or provide internet service to private customers, such as San Luis Valley Electric co-op and Fast Track Communications, Walters said. Fast Track was started by La Plata Electric Association and Empire Electric Association.

CDOT’s fiber on the west side of the pass would connect to cameras and signs that could alert drivers to accidents and other hazards, Constan said.

The Southwest Colorado of Council of Governments is pursing funding to build an open access fiber line from Dove Creek to Wolf Creek and councilor’s fiber could tie into CDOT’s project, Gillow-Wiles said.

The council would also like to build open access fiber from Cortez to Telluride. The lines could increase internet service competition in communities across the region, she said.

mshinn@durangoherald.com