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Wyoming Did Propose Drilling A Tunnel Through Teton Pass But It Never…

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Wyoming Did Propose Drilling A Tunnel Through Teton Pass But It Never…


Dreams are just that.

Nothing more, unless there’s lots of money sloshing around in the U.S. Treasury that can make them happen.

In late 2021, the federal government had so much taxpayer money in its overstuffed wallet that it made available to every state when the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act got signed into law.

The law set aside over $1.2 trillion for everything from rebuilding bridges and roads to improving electrical grids and building wind turbines and solar projects in open spaces across the United States.

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Boring tunnels through mountains for desperately needed road projects also were considered.

Three years ago, governors — like Mark Gordon in Wyoming — were asked to come up with a “wish list” of road, bridge and other projects where they could apply for billions to fund pet transportation projects.

In Wyoming, the job of coming up with some of the list fell to Luke Reiner, the now retired head of the Wyoming Department of Transportation.

It also was an opportunity to try and get money for a bucket-list item on the state’s wish list — a tunnel through the Teton Range to replace a chronically problematic Highway 22 over Teton Pass.

It Would Cost How Much?

Back in January 2013, the Wyoming Department of Transportation took a serious look at the possibility of building a tunnel through the Tetons, bypassing all the switchbacks that snake back and forth in the area where the road collapsed down the mountainside June 8.

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The estimated price tag to build the tunnel in 2021 was $750 million, according to WYDOT spokesman Doug Moran. That’s up 188% from the $260 million estimated in 2013 when the idea first surfaced with a feasibility study.

Adding another 15.9% cumulative rate of inflation since 2021 and a tunnel like the one proposed by WYDOT more than a decade ago could cost nearly $870 million today.

That’s well over three times the cost of the tunnel’s price tag estimated by WYDOT analysts a decade ago.

With the pass open again with a temporary fix and WYDOT planning to rebuild the part of the mountain that gave way, some are asking if it’s not time to reconsider a tunnel.

‘Hugely Expensive’

“It’s hugely expensive,” said Luke Reiner, who retired as WYDOT director in March 2023 after a four-year stint at the helm of the state agency. “It’s all about money.”

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Also, Wyoming Highway 22 is a headache.

It needs constant maintenance and repair in the winter months when snow is several feet deep, and another project getting penciled out would widen the road to the heavy daily traffic through the Teton Pass.

The highway connects Victor and Driggs in Idaho where the blue-collar workforce lives, which serves the high-brow community of Jackson, Wyoming, where the people from Idaho fill jobs in hospitals, restaurants and expensive clothing and arts and craft stores.

“Part of the reason for putting it in would be the cost of maintenance in the winter,” Reiner told Cowboy State Daily of the patching and repairs that it spends annually on fixing Wyoming Highway 22, the main route through the Teton Pass.

While the tunnel never got funded, Reiner added another perspective, possibly one of greater good for the country.

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“As you look at the needs of the state and the needs of the nation, things always get whittled down. There certainly may be an option at some later time,” he said.

“There may be more important issues out there. That’s what you must keep in perspective,” Reiner said. “The reality is, I would not hold my breath for funding.”

The ‘Dream List’

The “dream list” that Reiner gave to Gordon for submission to the Biden administration back in 2021 included more than $9.4 billion in projects.

These included the $750 million Teton Pass tunnel project, $400 million in improvements to the three Wind River tunnels in the canyon south of Thermopolis, $310 million for improvements to the 80 and Interstate 25 interchange in Cheyenne, and $6.1 billion for rerouting 19 miles of I-80 onto an expanded U.S. 30 to four lanes in south central Wyoming for truckers to travel on as an alternative route during icy and rainy weather or to bypass pileups.

“There was a very nice increase in funding from the infrastructure law that resulted in significant enhanced revenue coming back to the state,” Reiner said. “But inflation has a great way of eating up those dollars. In the end, the bipartisan infrastructure law allowed us to complete projects we already scheduled without cutting them.”

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The Road Collapses

While Wyoming didn’t receive billions of dollars for it’s shovel-worthy projects, the Department of Transportation’s Federal Highway Administration did hand over $6 million in emergency money to help offset the costs of repairs in the Teton Range caused by last month’s landslide.

The funds were used to build “a safe, temporary detour” near the Wyoming-Idaho border that restores critical access to popular tourist destinations such as Jackson Hole, Yellowstone National Park and Grand Teton National Park.

The collapse of Wyoming State Highway 22, also known as Teton Pass, happened June 8 when 200 feet of the road washed down an embankment, causing a complete loss of the roadway at milepost 12.8.

Another landslide happened a day earlier at milepost 15, covering the highway in mud and debris. No vehicles were on the highway at the time of the collapse and there were no injuries reported.

Crews worked around-the-clock to clean up the water, mud and debris that washed down the mountain from these disasters.

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The road was reopened June 28 to traffic that WYDOT says handles about 7,200 vehicles annually, with counts climbing to 10,000 in June and July during peak tourism season.

WYDOT’s alternative to a washed-out Highway 22 over Teton Pass in Wyoming is the reason why everyone drove more than 100 miles along five highways of bumper-to-bumper traffic from Victor, Idaho, at the border with Wyoming, to Jackson.

Less than three weeks after a section of mountain dropped off and took part of Highway 22 with it, the temporary fix is just that.

Rebuilding The Mountain

Plans now are for WYDOT to rebuild the mountain and the road on its original spot.

It will be a massive undertaking, but WYDOT won’t be considering a tunnel as a long-term solution.

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“It isn’t feasible,” Moran told Cowboy State Daily.

To Reiner, there were advantages to a tunnel that would have extended 1.4 miles, or 7,400 feet, from different spots under consideration near the switchbacks, completely bypassing the road area that slid down the mountainside.

The tunnel site would have extended well over a mile from just west of Wilson, Wyoming, to somewhere near the turnoff for Mail Cabin Creek Road, according to a copy of the feasibility study obtained by Cowboy State Daily.

“You wouldn’t have to plow it because it’s under a mountain. There are some good operational reasons to do it,” Reiner said. “Every time you can’t drive through the Teton Pass because of a snowstorm, you’ve got to get a plow driver up in the middle of the night.”

There also are disadvantages, he said.

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“Operationally, there are some drawbacks, like whether it is well ventilated, and you must be careful of safety on either end of the tunnel, and work to mitigate that,” Reiner said. “When you look at the big picture, you have to say, ‘Is this the best project for our dollar?’”

Rising Maintenance Costs

Tunnels are expensive propositions. There may be lessons to be learned from Colorado to the south.

Bob Wilson, a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Transportation, said that it is unlikely his state would ever again build another tunnel.

“We’re not building any tunnels. It’s too cost prohibitive,” Wilson said.

Its hallmark tunnel project was the Eisenhower-Johnson Memorial Tunnel, built in two sections in the 1970s that connected the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains to the Western Slope.

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Located about 60 miles west of Denver on Interstate 70, the two eastbound and westbound tunnels extend 1.7 miles through the Rockies.

It cost $262 million to build both bores between 1968 and 1979, or the equivalent of about $1.2 billion in today dollars, Wilson said.

“We’re just expanding the existing structure today,” said Wilson of the tunnel that handles nearly seven times as much traffic volume as the Teton Pass in its busy tourism season.

And maintenance in the city-like area where the tunnels are located is a constant challenge. It’s risen nearly 37% to $4.1 million in two years to pay for a fire department, plumbers and electricians.

“It’s kind of like a mini-city,” Wilson said. “The maintenance is quite significant, as you’ve got to keep the sides of the walls clean because they get filthy, especially in the winter with traffic, and plumbing for water systems and lights. It must be self-sufficient. The nearest city is 12 miles away.”

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In the early 2000s, there was talk about building another tunnel through Berthoud Pass, a high mountain pass in central Colorado, in the Front Range of the Rockies.

“We decided to go over the Berthoud Pass, not through it,” Wilson said.

“It was eliminated fairly early in the study process since the cost was prohibitive and any funds for tunnels would be more focused on the Eisenhower due to its location on the interstate and much higher traffic numbers,” Wilson told Cowboy State Daily.

Pat Maio can be reached at pat@cowboystatedaily.com.



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Casper veteran David Giralt joins race for Wyoming U.S. House seat

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Casper veteran David Giralt joins race for Wyoming U.S. House seat


CASPER, Wyo. — David Giralt, a Casper-raised military veteran and conservative Republican, has announced his candidacy for Wyoming’s lone seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. The congressional seat is being vacated by Republican Rep. Harriet Hageman, who launched a campaign in December for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by retiring Sen. Cynthia Lummis. […]



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Rivalries and Playoff Positioning Highlight Week 11 Wyoming Girls Basketball Slate

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Rivalries and Playoff Positioning Highlight Week 11 Wyoming Girls Basketball Slate


It’s Week 11 in the 2026 Wyoming prep girls’ basketball season. That means it’s the end of the regular season. 3A and 4A schools have their final game or games to determine seeding before the regional tournament, or if a team is locked into a position, one last chance to fine-tune before the postseason. Games are spread across four days.

WYOPREPS WEEK 11 GIRLS BASKETBALL SCHEDULE 2026

Every game on the slate is a conference matchup. Several rivalry contests are part of this week’s schedule, such as East against Central, Cody at Powell, Lyman hosting Mountain View, and Rock Springs at Green River, just to name a few. Here is the Week 11 schedule of varsity games WyoPreps has. All schedules are subject to change. If you see a game missing, please email david@wyopreps.com.

CLASS 4A

Final Score: Laramie 68 Cheyenne South 27 (conference game)

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CLASS 3A

Final Score: Lyman 40 Mountain View 26 (conference game)

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CLASS 4A

Final Score: Evanston 41 Riverton 39 (conference game)

Final Score: Natrona County 42 Kelly Walsh 38 (conference game) – Peach Basket Classic

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Final Score: #4 Thunder Basin 64 Campbell County 32 (conference game)

CLASS 3A

Final Score: #1 Cody 77 Worland 33 (conference game) – 5 different Fillies with a 3, and Hays led the way with 34 points.

Final Score: #2 Lander 49 Lyman 34 (conference game)

Final Score: #4 Wheatland 51 Douglas 40 (conference game)

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Final Score: #5 Powell 48 Lovell 42 (conference game)

Final Score: Burns 56 Torrington 43 (conference game)

Final Score: Glenrock 78 Newcastle 30 (conference game)

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WyoPreps Girls Basketball Week 1 Scores 2025-26

 

CLASS 4A

Rock Springs at #2 Green River, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

#4 Thunder Basin at #5 Sheridan, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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#1 Cheyenne East at #3 Cheyenne Central, 6 p.m. (conference game)

Jackson at Star Valley, 6 p.m. (conference game)

CLASS 3A

#3 Pinedale at Mountain View, 4 p.m. (conference game)

#1 Cody at #5 Powell, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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Buffalo at Glenrock, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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CLASS 3A

Newcastle at Buffalo, 12:30 p.m. (conference game)

Glenrock at Rawlins, 3 p.m. (conference game)

Torrington at #4 Wheatland, 5:30 p.m. (conference game)

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Submit a Score to WyoPreps

 

Wyoming Boys 4A Swimming & Diving State Championships 2026

4A Boys State Swim Meet for 2026 in Cheyenne

Gallery Credit: David Settle, WyoPreps.com





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Political storm in Wyoming as far-right activist caught handing checks to lawmakers

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Political storm in Wyoming as far-right activist caught handing checks to lawmakers


Controversy has engulfed Wyoming’s state legislature after a conservative activist was photographed handing checks to Republican lawmakers on the state house floor, in an incident that has highlighted intra-conservative divisions and the role of money in the Cowboy state’s politics.

The political storm started on 9 February, when Karlee Provenza, a Democratic lawmaker, took a photo showing Rebecca Bextel, a conservative activist and committeewoman for the Teton county Republican party, handing a check to Darin McCann, a Republican representative, on the legislative floor. Marlene Brady, another Republican representative, stands in the photo’s background, a similar piece of paper pinched between her fingers.

“You have a person from the richest county in the country coming down to Cheyenne to hand out checks on the house floor,” Provenza said. “I have never seen something so egregious.”

Questions around the checks were soon swirling, and answers weren’t forthcoming. When asked what Bextel gave to her, Brady told a reporter for local outlet WyoFile: “I can’t remember.”

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Then Bextel herself addressed the incident. “I raised $400,000 in the last election cycle for conservative candidates, and I will be doubling that amount this year,” Bextel wrote on Facebook on 11 February. “There’s nothing wrong with delivering lawful campaign checks from Teton county donors when I am in Cheyenne.”

Since then, it has emerged that the checks came from Don Grasso, a wealthy Teton county donor, who told the Jackson Hole News and Guide that he wrote the checks for Bextel to deliver to 10 Freedom caucus-aligned politicians. Grasso said the checks were intended as campaign contributions, and were not tied to specific legislation. It is unclear how many checks were ultimately delivered, but two of four confirmed recipients include the speaker of the house, Chip Neiman, and John Bear, the former head of the Wyoming Freedom Caucus.

The Wyoming house has formed a legislative investigative committee, and the Laramie county sheriff’s office said they’d open a criminal investigation.

Bextel declined to answer questions from the Guardian. Brady, McCann and Bear did not respond to requests for comment.

Neiman said he considered the criticism a “wraparound smear campaign”. He said: “It never once crossed my mind that this was bribery.

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“These legislators, myself included, are now guilty until we can prove that we’re innocent. How is that right in this country? Isn’t that a little bit backwards?”

The scandal has highlighted long-standing divisions in Wyoming’s Republican party, which in recent years has seen a growing divide between old school, more moderate conservatives and a harder-right Freedom Caucus.

Several former Republican lawmakers forcefully condemned their colleagues for accepting the checks, and a local Republican party branch called for the lawmakers’ resignations.

Ogden Driskill, a Wyoming Republican senator, told the Guardian he does not consider Bextel’s actions to be illegal, but that “just because you can do it doesn’t mean you should”.

Bextel has spent years pushing against housing mitigation fees in Wyoming, and Driskill noted that she distributed the house floor checks just days before a bill she had publicly supported was set to be heard. Bextel was registered as a member of the press, not as a lobbyist when she delivered the checks.

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“Ethically and morally, it’s bankrupt to a massive degree,” Driskill said.

Neiman said that he and other legislators who received checks have supported similar bills in the past: “Bribery is paying somebody to do something they would not otherwise do.”

Nationally, the 2024 election cycle saw record-spending from the mega-wealthy, as well as dark money groups. Wyoming followed the trend, in a tense red-on-red primary season.

For those gearing up to campaign this year, Teton county, the richest in the US, and Bextel’s picturesque home turf, is an essential stop. Its extreme wealth gives it a foothold on the national level as well. Palantir chief executive Alex Karp and Donald Trump attended an annual Republican leadership fundraiser at Jackson Hole in 2024, and JD Vance attended the same one in 2025.

Bextel pulls dollars from Teton county into the Freedom Caucus side of Wyoming’s conservative split. She hosted no-press-allowed meet and greets earlier this year benefitting leading candidates for Wyoming’s governor and open US House seat.

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In an interview with the Open Range Record, a media network she co-founded, Bextel said controversy around the checks was solely because she was making “even playing field” in Wyoming against the state’s more moderate Republicans, who she calls “George Soros” candidates. She said that she will be sure to keep raising money – just away from the legislative floor.

“I guess I’m gonna ask all the gentlemen and gentleladies to step outside the Capitol while I hand them a check,” Bextel said. “Let me be clear: I’m doubling down.”

But it’s not just wealthy local donors putting their weight behind the factions. Last election cycle, out of state groups spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on anonymous and often inaccurate mailers.

“These actors, especially from the far right, they like to push the bounds of the norms,” said Rosa Reyna Pugh, an organizing and advocacy consultant at Western States Center, an Oregon-based non-profit focused on democracy in the western United States. “They like to see what policies they can kind of push, and see where they can play a piece,” Reyna Pugh said.

While Neiman and Driskill fight politically, they do agree on one thing: summer will bring an expensive and brutal campaign season.

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“You’re going to see more dark money than you’ve ever seen. We’ve done absolutely nothing to enforce it. Our secretary of state has not even made a slight attempt to deal with it,” Driskill said. “You’re going to see lots and lots of outside money and I think you’re seeing it on both sides.”

As national questions swirl around pay-to-play politics and profiteering in the Trump administration, Provenza wants better for the Cowboy State.

“We should not be aligning ourselves with how the federal government is conducting itself or how federal elections conduct themselves,” Provenza said. “We owe something far better and more honest to the people of Wyoming than that.”



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