Imogene Pass stays closed after crash on Colorado mountain route
A June 18 crash kept Imogene Pass shut, blocking the Telluride-to-Ouray crossing and forcing high-country trip plans to pivot.
A June 18 vehicle crash kept Imogene Pass closed in San Miguel County, cutting off one of southwest Colorado’s signature high-country links between Telluride and Ouray. The San Miguel County Sheriff’s Office said the pass would remain closed until further notice, and rumors that it had opened that day proved wrong.
That matters because Imogene is not a casual scenic pull-off. The route tops out at 13,114 feet on Tomboy Road, and the U.S. Forest Service calls it a challenging off-highway vehicle route that connects Telluride and Ouray. Visit Telluride describes it as a rugged five-mile climb to Tomboy, then another 10 miles east to Ouray, with the road passing through Savage Basin and the privately owned Tomboy townsite. From the Telluride side, it also threads past views of Bridal Veil and Ingram Falls, which is part of why the pass draws Jeepers, dual-sport riders, and overlanders every summer.
The closure leaves a real routing problem for anyone trying to stitch together a classic San Juans day loop. At the time of the crash, other nearby routes were open, including Ophir Pass, Last Dollar Road, and the Norwood-Dolores route, while Black Bear Pass and Imogene were not. For riders and drivers building around Telluride and Ouray, that changes everything: a planned crossing becomes a dead end, and a backcountry day built around a summit-to-summit traverse has to be rebuilt around a different pass.
The uncertainty is the bigger issue. San Miguel County posts Imogene opening and closure notices on its road-conditions page, and when the route is open on the San Miguel County side, the county tells travelers to check Ouray County for conditions on the other side. The route has also been vulnerable before to road damage, bridge repairs, and public-safety closures, and county officials said in 2025 that severe damage to Tomboy Road could keep vehicular access, including motorcycles, shut until at least September from the Telluride side. For now, the safest assumption is that Imogene is still not the summer shortcut between Telluride and Ouray, and trip plans need to follow a different line through the mountains.
This article was produced by Prism’s automated news system from verified source data, official records, and press releases, then run through automated quality and moderation checks before publishing. The system is built and supervised by the people who set the standards it runs under. Read our full AI policy.
Did this article answer your question?
