Pleas made by skiers and snowboarders for more enforcement of road-worthy vehicles during the sketchiest days in the Cottonwood canyons are, quite literally, gaining traction.
This winter, the Utah Department of Transportation plans to increase its enforcement of the state’s traction laws on State Route 210 and SR 190, the two mostly two-lane highways that lead to and from the popular Cottonwood Canyon ski resorts.
The strategy, according to UDOT’s presentation to the Salt Lake County Council on Tuesday, is two-pronged. Agency officials said they would create checkpoints at the base of the canyons on days the law is in effect. They also plan to give more teeth to the agency’s sticker program for drivers who have their tires pre-inspected.
UDOT will formally announce the initiative at a news conference Thursday.
“We listen to our customers, and we try to do the best thing we can, but the canyon is just not one entity. It’s several different entities that have to coexist and we have to work all together,” Jake Brown, UDOT’s district engineer for the Cottonwood Canyons, said in an interview with The Salt Lake Tribune last month.
While Brown declined to give specifics at the time, he said, “I think in this time that we’ve pulled together and we’ve come up with something special that I think the public will be pleased with.”
In theory, the traction law deters vehicles ill-equipped for traveling in snowy and icy conditions from driving on Utah’s roads. Though various workarounds are allowed, a car or truck basically needs to be 4-wheel-drive or have snow or “3-Peak Mountain Snowflake” tires with at least 2/32nds-inch tread on all four wheels or be equipped with a traction device such as chains to drive when the traction law is in effect.
But it’s not that simple. In actuality, the traction law is not a law, but rather an administrative rule. And citations can only be issued by the Unified Police Department. Yet UPD can’t enforce the rule until UDOT determines ice, snow or factors like low visibility will disrupt normal driving. At that point, UDOT will switch on the flashing lights on the traction signs at the bottom of each canyon. But by then, cars that don’t have adequate traction may already be in the canyon.
When those cars attempt to leave the canyon, they have a higher probability of sliding out, getting stuck or traveling at a snail’s pace — all of which can jam up traffic for hours. Just such a scenario last Presidents Day weekend spurred a flurry of tweets from frustrated drivers.
“A flashing light sign literally does nothing,” wrote Salt Lake City-based skier Mike Schmidt at the time. “If @UDOTcottonwoods thinks this is ‘enforcing’ a law, they are crazy.”
UPD officials told The Tribune in March that they had no good options. They can’t cite drivers preemptively, and pulling violators over in a snowstorm would be dangerous and likely slow traffic further. They also, they said, have just five officers to patrol the six major canyons in Salt Lake County — too few to assign most of them to traction patrol every time it snows.
Under the new arrangement, it seems, UPD will have more tools to cut the problem off at the source. The Sandy and Cottonwood Heights police departments are expected to send more officers to the base of both Big and Little Cottonwood Canyon when the traction law is enacted — which UDOT is considering doing prior to big storms, not just during them. Those officers will check for traction devices and measure tire tread and turn around cars that don’t comply.
It is unclear how the agencies expect to pay for the additional officers. Earlier this year, however, state lawmakers approved redirecting up to 2% of the state’s Cottonwood Canyons Transportation Investment Fund each year to address safety issues such as traction in the canyons.
More satisfying for locals, though, may be UDOT’s sticker plan.
UDOT introduced a pilot Cottonwood Canyons sticker program in January 2020 with the intention of speeding up the long lines that were forming when officers performed traction checks. In the years since, however, the sticker has become little more than a window decoration. While it can reassure motorists that their vehicle is equipped to travel through the canyons, it was rarely, if ever, checked by officials.
Locals want the program to work, though. In a social media post Thursday, UDOT disclosed that a survey revealed 43% of respondents wanted the sticker program to continue in 2024-25. Another 54% said they wanted it to continue “but only with more enforcement by local law enforcement agencies.”
So starting this winter, the sticker — which can be obtained for free at designated tire shops throughout Salt Lake Valley from Thursday through Feb. 28 — will be to skiers what Disneyland’s Genie+ pass is to amusement park goers. Those with it displayed will be able to skip the traction line and head straight up the canyon.
Mike Maughan, the Alta Ski Area general manager who has been outspoken about traffic issues in Little Cottonwood Canyon, said he still has some concerns. One is how much the additional enforcement will slow traffic coming up the canyon. Another is whether cars without proper traction will continue to be allowed up even with a storm looming. Still, he called the changes “a step in the right direction.
“I’m eager to understand all the details of how this will work,” he said, “but I’m excited to reduce the number of vehicles in the canyon that don’t have adequate traction devices.”
UDOT first hinted at the changes in a social media post in September. The video opens with Brown, another UDOT employee and representatives of the Sandy and Cottonwood Heights police departments sitting in their vehicles reading angry tweets about the lack of traction enforcement. Brown then calls for a confab with the others, the power of which is ground shaking.
“We’re getting everybody reminded that we want them to participate in the sticker program and it’s going to be beneficial this year,” UDOT’s Brown said last month, “and it’s going to help the canyon move a little more smoothly.”
The Salt Lake County Council on Tuesday gave UDOT’s plan its unanimous approval.
This may just be the start of the push to improve the driving experience in the canyons. Rep. Gay Lynn Bennion, D-Cottonwood Heights, has opened a bill file for next year’s legislative session that would enshrine the canyon’s traction requirements in state law. The bill would also increase the required tread depth in the Cottonwood Canyons to 5/32nds of an inch from Nov. 1 through April 15.
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