Ask around town and you'll hear the same line: Red Grade is closed for the summer, so cross it off the list until next year. That's the version making the rounds at the Sport Stop and in trailhead parking lot conversations. It's also not quite right.
What Sheridan County actually posted is a schedule, not a shutdown. There's a real difference between the two, and the difference is worth nine hours of your week, not your whole season.
What the County Actually Closed
The project covers 2.5 miles of Red Grade Road, running from milepost 0.95 to milepost 3.48, starting at the Base trailhead and extending out in both directions from there. Crews are widening the road, adding pullouts, improving drainage, and replacing or upgrading culverts on a route that's seen traffic triple over the past five years. This first phase alone is a two-season build, running from spring 2026 through fall 2027. A second phase, covering mileposts 3.48 to 10.9, is pending funding and hasn't been scheduled yet.
Three trailheads sit inside that construction zone: Base, Springs, and Aspens. During work hours, their parking lots may also serve as staging areas for equipment, which means even walking in isn't always an option.
That's the real closure. It's narrower than the rumor.
The Nine Hours That Actually Matter
Here's the schedule, straight from Sheridan Community Land Trust's trail closure page, last updated July 27:
| Time Block | Status |
|---|---|
| Monday–Friday, 8 a.m.–noon | Closed |
| Monday–Friday, noon–1 p.m. | Open |
| Monday–Friday, 1 p.m.–6 p.m. | Closed |
| Weekends and holidays | Fully open |
Add it up and the road is inaccessible for nine hours on a weekday, not nine hours a week. Weekends are untouched. Evenings after 6 p.m. are untouched. If you're the kind of rider who goes up after work or heads out Saturday morning, the construction schedule barely touches your routine.
The people who actually lose something are the midday crowd: retirees who go up before lunch, remote workers who use their break for a trail run, anyone whose free hour happens to fall between 8 and 6 on a weekday. For that group, the schedule does leave a workaround. The federal notice authorizing the closure specifies that local residential access will be allowed during the morning, noon, and afternoon/evening commutes, which is the same principle behind the daily lunch window. It's not generous, but it's real: if you can be through the construction zone by 8 a.m. or wait until after 6 p.m., you still get your ride.
County Commissioner Nick Siddle, discussing the project on Sheridan Media's Public Pulse, said the work is meant to improve safety, traffic flow, and drainage along the route, and that a favorable stretch of weather could get most of it wrapped up before snow flies. If that holds, the inconvenience window shrinks even further as fall approaches.
Two Closures Got Blurred Into One Story
Some of the anxiety floating around town this summer is actually leftover from a different, already-resolved closure. Back in May, a separate improvement project shut down a section of the Let 'em Roll trail, between Elliot's Saddle and Base Trailhead, while a contractor reshaped turns and improved drainage on that specific segment. That closure was expected to last two to three weeks and had nothing to do with the road project. It wrapped months ago.
But the timing overlapped with early chatter about the road construction, and the two stories merged in casual conversation into one bigger, vaguer sense that Red Grade was off-limits. It isn't. One short trail closure already happened and ended. One road schedule is still running, and it only bites during specific weekday hours.
Where the Regulars Are Actually Riding This Week
None of this affects Soldier Ridge, which is worth remembering if Red Grade's schedule doesn't fit your day. The Soldier Ridge Trail System sits five minutes from downtown at the end of W 5th Street, where pavement turns to gravel. It links more than 10 miles of trail, including Hidden Hoot, The Link, Kicking Horse, and Double Eagle, none of which touch the construction zone on Red Grade Road because they're accessed from an entirely different set of trailheads.
For dog owners whose schedule got scrambled by the Base and Springs closures, the SCLT Big Goose Natural Area remains one of the few off-leash options in the area, with creek access and open space that doesn't depend on Red Grade at all.
And if trailheads aren't the point, the Tongue River Water Trail offers a way to spend the same hour on the water instead, with float access points scattered through central Sheridan County that have nothing to do with any of this.
Checking Before You Go
Construction schedules move. SCLT has said plainly that the details are subject to change week to week based on what comes out of ongoing project meetings, and they're updating their trail closure page accordingly. If you're planning around a specific afternoon, it's worth a quick check before you load the truck, or a call to Sheridan County Public Works at (307) 675-2420 if you want it from the source.
If your usual window gets eaten by the schedule this week, Sheridan College is hosting Music on the Mall on Thursday, August 27, from 4 to 8 p.m. on the Whitney Mall. It's free, family-friendly, and kicks off with Sheridan's own Trout Goggles playing bluegrass built around fishing songs and mountain life, which is about as fitting a soundtrack as you'll find for a summer spent working around a road crew.
Red Grade will be back to full access outside those weekday hours, and fully open again once the season's work wraps. Until then, the trail's not gone. It's just keeping banker's hours.
If you're weighing a move to a town where the biggest summer inconvenience is a nine-hour construction window on a gravel mountain road, that says something about the place worth paying attention to. Chad A Conley has spent years helping people find their footing in Sheridan County, from the trailheads to the closing table. Let's Connect when you're ready to talk about what living here actually looks like.
