Flaggers still at Richardson Highway MP 210 as rock blasting wraps up

Flaggers and pilot cars are still controlling traffic at Milepost 210 of the Richardson Highway, where blasting crews cleared the last of an unstable rock outcrop last week and the Alaska Department of Transportation and Public Facilities expects the work to finish this week.

The department has not posted the work on Alaska 511, the state traveler information service, which carries two other Richardson Highway projects.

Crews had scaled the area by hand, with pry bars and air pillows. About 15 feet of rock remained at the end of Sunday's shift, 12 feet high and eight feet thick.

Freight carriers depend on the corridor. The Alaska Strategic Freight Plan counts more than 150 trucks a day south of Fairbanks on the 366-mile Valdez-to-Fairbanks route. The enacted FY2026 capital budget allocated $323,853 for the work.

At a Sept. 17, 2025, update, Northern Region preconstruction engineer Al Beck said "a rock along the hillside fairly close to the right-of-way that needs to come down and some scaling associated with it."