Sun Road won't be open over Logan Pass by July 4 weekend. Meanwhile tickets are selling out in a couple of minutes
CHRIS PETERSON | Hagadone News Network | UPDATED 4 years, 1 month AGO
A Glacier Park rotary plow clears the Logan Pass parking lot in this file photo.
Chris Peterson is the editor of the Hungry Horse News. He covers Columbia Falls, the Canyon, Glacier National Park and the Bob Marshall Wilderness. All told, about 4 million acres of the best parts of the planet. He can be reached at [email protected] or 406-892-2151. | June 27, 2022 5:40 AM
Glacier National Park has announced that the Going-to-the-Sun Road will not be fully open by the July 4 holiday, though plows have made it to Logan Pass.
The park made the announcement on social media Friday.
The plowing effort this spring has been beset by heavy rain and snow. The last storm dumped more than two feet of snow in the higher terrain. That wave of storms also dumped more than 6 inches of rain on the west side of the Glacier in a 10-day period.
Crews had to plow through avalanches slides to get back to where they were before the storms. Snow depths at Rimrocks were 25 feet deep and 6 feet deep at Oberlin Bend.
Even once at Logan Pass, they still have to clear the Big Drift just east of the pass, which was expected to start this week. The drift is typically 50 to 60 feet deep.
The latest openings of the Sun Road ever were July 13. In 2020 the road opened late due to the coronavirus pandemic. That year, the entire east side of Glacier was closed.
In 2011, which was another cold and snowy year, the road did not open up and over Logan Pass until July 13 as well.
The earliest opening? May 16, 1987.
Whenever the road does open, it will be a short season on the west side of the Park, as the road from Apgar to Lake McDonald Lodge will close Oct. 1 permanently for the winter due to utility work. That effectively blocks access from the west side.
That work is scheduled to go until May of next year.
Logan Pass will be open from the east side, as long as the weather holds. The road typically closes to Logan Pass by mid-October.
Folks are reminded they need a reservation to enter the Sun Road from 6 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Reservations are going fast — the Hungry Horse News tried to purchase a ticket at 8:01 a.m. Monday and received an error saying too many people were requesting tickets.
There were only 548 tickets available to begin with according to the site.
In about three minutes they had completely sold out.
Folks can still get into the west side of Glacier without a ticket after 4 p.m. But last week, the line was out on Highway 2 for about a half mile.
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