Durango and La Plata County complete $9.7 million road rebuild

Durango and La Plata County marked the finish of the County Road 250/251 rebuild with a ribbon-cutting set for 10 a.m. Thursday, June 25, closing a $9.7 million project that began in April 2024. The work centered on one of northeast Durango’s busiest connectors, where cars, bikes, pedestrians and transit riders all had to share the same stretch of pavement.

The rebuild kept one lane of traffic in each direction but added the pieces that make a corridor easier to use day to day. City project materials say the work added dedicated bike lanes, a shared-use path, a landscaped center median, additional streetlights, enhanced pedestrian crossings, dedicated left-turn lanes and a transit stop. Stormwater work was a major part of the job too, including installation of a 36-inch reinforced concrete pipe beneath the roadway to improve drainage and long-term safety performance.

That matters on a corridor like this because the payoff is not ceremonial. It is fewer conflicts at the intersection, a cleaner place for riders to move through, and a safer crossing for people on foot trying to navigate the same road that carries commuter traffic. The city described the project as a collaboration between Durango and La Plata County, built to improve safety, multimodal connectivity and the overall function of the County Road 250/251 intersection.

The money trail was set earlier. In January 2024, La Plata County approved up to $4.4 million toward the redevelopment, with the city and county splitting costs equally under the intergovernmental agreement tied to annexation of a section of County Road 251 and part of County Road 250. Mayor Dave Woodruff and County Commissioner Chair Matt Salka both framed the rebuild as a safety and partnership accomplishment, not just a road resurfacing job.

Construction was not a quick pass with fresh asphalt. It stretched across multiple seasons and was interrupted by winter breaks, utility relocations and other complications. By the time the ribbon was cut, the payoff for weekend riders, commuters and anyone moving through northeast Durango was visible in the lane layout itself: a road that still moves traffic, but no longer forces every mode to fight for the same narrow strip of space.