UDOT shares travel time estimates for Heber Valley bypass options

Wasatch County leaders have been discussing plans for a bypass to pull traffic away from Heber City’s Main Street for decades.

The Utah Department of Transportation admitted in October it waited too long to choose a route, and without adjustments, none of the options it had been considering would be enough to meet the valley’s needs.

At a Wasatch County Council meeting Wednesday, Dec. 11, UDOT regional project manager Craig Hancock said the agency is on schedule to finalize a route by spring 2026. He said UDOT is creating an amended list of route options.

Hancock showed early designs of the four new bypass possibilities. Two would connect to U.S. 40 at 900 North, with new lanes added to U.S. 40. The other two would travel through the North Fields and reconnect with U.S. 40 at River Road.

Of the four possible route paths, UDOT said all could either be built on the ground, with lower impact to surrounding areas, or with overpasses and ramps, speeding up drive times.

“We’re in the process of modifying the alternatives, and they basically are falling into two types of modifications,” he said. “First one is where we’re adding an additional lane onto North U.S. 40. This is for our at-grade alternatives.”

That would mean three lanes of traffic in each direction north of Heber’s 900 North intersection at ground level.

The other option is what Hancock calls “free-flow alternatives.”

“Basically, what this means is that somebody traveling through could basically traverse the whole bypass alignment without having to stop,” he said.

For at-grade routes cutting through the North Fields, UDOT predicts it would take eight or nine minutes to drive between the River Road intersection and state Route 189 just south of town.

The same routes with free-flow adjustments could cut travel time to around six minutes, according to predictions for the evening rush hour in 2050.

If the bypass reconnected to a widened U.S. 40 at 900 North, at-grade options would take 10 to 13 minutes to travel between the same points. Free-flow options would take seven minutes or so.

Utah Department of Transportation

“I’m giving you hot-off-the-press information here,” Hancock said.

Hancock noted the free-flow options would be faster, but the impacts to the landscape would be greater than routes without grade separation.

Hancock also showed how much time UDOT predicts drivers could save by using the bypass instead of traveling via Main Street. At-grade options connecting to 900 North would save the least time, while free-flow routes would be the most efficient. Those predictions also used models of rush hour traffic in 2050.

He stressed no solution will eliminate traffic in downtown Heber.

“Main Street’s always going to be busy, no matter what we do,” he said. “But we will see some good diversion off of 40 onto the bypass.”

Hancock said UDOT will continue to meet with Heber City and Wasatch County leaders with updates about the bypass. It will also meet with the Wasatch Open Lands Board in January 2025 about conservation easements and the bypass.