During the first week of October, our electric construction crew performed maintenance work on Pikes Peak. This work was initially scheduled to take place in 2022, but the challenging terrain, winter weather conditions, and the business needs of Pikes Peak - America’s Mountain led to postponing the project to 2023. We always keep safety and weather conditions in mind when performing maintenance work on our infrastructure.
With all their tools, materials and safety equipment on their backs, our crew hiked to the job site on a section of the mountain that is inaccessible to vehicles. This location is one of the least accessible lines on our system and presents a great challenge when maintenance is needed in this area.
The crews worked cautiously and stayed on schedule, successfully replacing two wood poles and seven crossarms on five power poles. The crew also performed some minor work and inspections on several other poles on the same line. To safely perform this work, we had to de-energize electric transmission lines, causing a power outage for some buildings and requiring backup power generation on other attractions on Pikes Peak. The work conducted in this dangerous terrain highlights our incredibly hardworking crews and the tremendous effort it takes to perform their jobs in our unique environment in Colorado Springs.
The team at Pikes Peak - America’s Mountain appreciated our outreach efforts and cooperation to coordinate this work during a timeframe with minimal impact on their operations and guests.
"We really valued the advance planning and communication from Colorado Springs Utilities throughout the process of this power outage and for executing it during our non-peak visitation period. Colorado Springs Utilities was very accommodating in this process to delay the power outage to the month of October when our hours of operations adjust for the season. This adjustment allowed for nominal impacts to our Crystal Gift Shop, Glen Cove Inn, and Summit Visitor Center operations." -Skyler Rorabaugh, Manager of Pikes Peak - America’s Mountain
We are passionately committed to safety in everything we do and are dedicated to providing our customers safe, reliable and competitively-priced utilities.