SR342 through Gold Hill will close for two days

Highway crews will shut down State Route 342 Thursday morning to complete the realignment of the road south of Gold Hill.

It’s the final piece of the roadwork paid for by Comstock Mining to move the road around the historic Silver Hills mineshaft, which has a history of collapses dating to the early 1900s.

Traffic will detour to State Route 341, the truck route that runs pretty much parallel to SR342 connecting U.S. 50 to Virginia City.

When that work is complete, the mining company will have not only realigned the road but capped the old mine shaft permanently.

As part of the project the company also paid to decontaminate the old mining fill material that dates back to the late 1800s.

The road will close at 6 a.m. and reopen 24 hours later.