The first significant snowfall of the season hit the Flathead Valley this week, but construction work on Going-to-the-Sun Road continues in Glacier National Park.

The park got a stiff dose of snow Tuesday, but it’s expected to clear up enough on the lower-elevation stretch of Sun Road for work to carry on, at least for a couple weeks, said Jack Gordon, the park’s landscape architect and lead coordinator with the Federal Highway Administration.

“They are not working today, but they’ll be working after this stuff blows through,” Gordon said Wednesday.

In recent weeks, about 25 workers with HK Contractors and Anderson Masonry have been working on a 3.5-mile section between the West Tunnel and Logan Pit.

In addition to rock masonry work along the road, the fall effort has involved milling existing asphalt and grading the road in preparation for paving.

“They’re trying to get everything done this year down low to get ready for paving,” Gordon said. “They really made headway on that section during this closure season.”

The closure season started in mid-October when Sun Road was closed to vehicle traffic beyond Avalanche Campground to provide construction crews unfettered access to the road.

Shoulder season work has accounted for much of the progress in a multiyear major reconstruction project on Sun Road that is approaching its final stages.

“This year, there was a huge amount of work that got done,” Gordon said.

After paving between Avalanche and West Tunnel next spring, crews will concentrate on segments between Big Bend and Logan Pass on the west side and between the pass and Siyeh Bend on the east side.

Both are expected to be finished by late next summer, concluding work on Sun Road’s alpine section, which has been the most difficult part of the overall reconstruction project.

The stretch between Big Bend and Logan Pass probably will involve the most work “because there’s so much stone masonry work that needs to be done,” Gordon said, adding that foul weather and snow forced work crews to move from the Big Bend stretch to lower elevations several weeks ago.