For traffic safety, the Nevada Department of Transportation has temporarily closed a portion of State Route 207 (Kingsbury Grade) following a sinkhole created by an eroding drainage pipe underneath the roadway.
The road will remain closed from the State Route 206/Foothill Road junction in the Carson Valley to the summit. Kingsbury Grade will remain open in the Lake Tahoe area to residential and business traffic between U.S. 50 and Tramway Drive at the summit. Alternative routes between the Carson Valley and Lake Tahoe are available through U.S. 50, State Route 431 and various routes in California.
As weather will play a factor, no timeframe for reopening is set, but the closure is anticipated to stay in place through coming weeks.
NDOT has been closely monitoring and will be contracting for emergency repairs to the sinking area of the roadway which developed over the past two weeks where a drainage pipe crosses underneath the road at mile marker 4.3, approximately 10 miles up the road on the Carson Valley side.
“Our priority is keeping Nevadans safe and mobile on our roadways,” said Mike Fuess, NDOT assistant district engineer for maintenance. “We have closed the bottom section of Kingsbury Grade to keep drivers safe. To quickly and safely reopen the road, we will initiate an emergency contract to repair this section of Kingsbury Grade.”
In 2014, NDOT reconstructed a different section of Kingsbury Grade, making improvements to roadway surface, drainage, curb and gutter and more. The current closure area is east of the reconstructed roadway, and not in the same area that was reconstructed. NDOT already has scheduled a project to invest approximately $5 million to enhance roadway drainage and erosion control on this lower section of Kingsbury Grade in 2019. The section of road is traveled by approximately 5,600 vehicles daily.
