Taylor column: It's time to do something about Highway 287

The highway claimed three more lives last week. Carson Muir, 18, Charlie Clark, 19, and Luke Slabber, 21, all died in a single-vehicle crash last Thursday at the intersection of Highway 287 and Red Mountain Road, northwest of Livermore in Larimer County, Colorado.

All three young adults were members of the University of Wyoming swimming and diving team. Two others were injured in the crash, and both were also members of the men’s team. Both were released from the hospital Friday, according to a Colorado State Patrol statement that did not identify the survivors.

Last week was an all-too-familiar tragedy for UW. In September 2001, eight members of UW’s cross-country team — Kevin Salverson, 19, of Cheyenne; Justin Lambert-Belanger, 20, of Timmins, Ontario, Canada; Cody Brown, 21, of Hudson, Colorado; Kyle Johnson, 20, of Riverton; Joshua Jones, 22, of Salem, Oregon; Morgan McLeland, 21, of Gillette; Nicholas Schabron, 20, of Laramie; and Shane Shatto, 19, of Douglas — were killed by a drunken driver in a two-vehicle collision south of Laramie.

In 2010, Ruben Narcisse, 19, a football player from Miami, Florida, was killed six miles south of the state line after a driver of the vehicle he was in fell asleep at the wheel. Tie Siding was also the site of a recent fatal accident involving a WyoTech student.

The stretch of highway connecting Laramie to Fort Collins has proven to be not only dangerous, but fatal for commuters year-round. The 30-mile section from north of Fort Collins to the Wyoming state line has had 570 crashes — including 15 fatal wrecks — in the past five years, according to a Colorado Department of Transportation report published in the Denver Post.

Portions of Highway 287 have above-average crash rates, making the highway a good candidate for more safety improvements, according to the same report.

“Having driven 287 many, many of times, (I know) just how dangerous that can be,” UW men’s basketball coach Jeff Linder said Saturday. “There’s just too many of these accidents happening on that road. ... If there’s any good that comes from this, it’s that, hopefully, there will be some changes to where that highway is expanded to four lanes like it is once it gets to Tie Siding. We know why that happened.

“There’s just too much traffic now with the semis, and people are way too impatient nowadays. Semis are going 65 (mph) and, lo and behold, you’ve got somebody that thinks that they’re important and they need to be some place in a hurry, when, in reality, that one minute is the difference between someone living and dying. Then, you add cell phones to the mix in this day and age.

“It’d be one thing if it was New York City or a place where you’ve got an issue in terms of land. Last time I checked ... there’s a lot of land between Laramie and (Fort Collins).”

Two and a half years ago while working for the Gillette News Record, I interviewed Kaylee McLeland when she was a 16-year-old junior at Thunder Basin High. She’d never met her uncle, Morgan, who was one of the eight victims from UW’s cross-country team in 2001.

Kaylee was participating in the annual Memory of the 8 run to honor those lost in the drunken driving accident. Morgan’s mom, Debbie, was also in attendance.

“The promise of these kids that was lost that morning on that highway is heartbreaking for all of us,” Debbie said at the event in 2021. “We miss them every day, and I know the other families miss their family members just as much as we miss Morgan.

“Every single one of them was a champion.”

More than two decades later, UW and the state of Wyoming will remember another tragedy on Highway 287 claiming the lives of three promising student-athletes in the swimming program. As Linder alluded to, if there’s any positives to come out of the loss of life, it’s progressive changes to make the commute from Laramie to Fort Collins safer for all involved.

Laramie resident Michael Garey recently started a petition asking for more law enforcement on Highway 287 after he was run off the road by an oncoming car trying to pass another vehicle. The story was published Jan. 10 in the Laramie Boomerang.

The petition reads: “This petition is in request of additional officer presence on Highway 287 due to high speeds and carelessness of other drivers on the road making it unsafe for the residents of the surrounding areas to enter and exit their dwellings subdivisions. Additional presence would ensure safety for all drivers and residents surrounding Highway 287.”

Another petition was started the day following the death of Muir, Clark and Slabber on Change.org to implement guard rails on Highway 287. The petition had over 2,200 signatures as of Tuesday.

While there’s no simple answer for safer road conditions, starting the conversation doesn’t hurt. Highway 287 has become a nightmare for commuters in both directions, and statistics for accidents on the road back up its reputation.

How many more lives must Highway 287 claim before real changes are made?

“Thoughts and prayers are with those that have been impacted,” Linder said. “... I just pray for those families and pray for those parents. I pray for the ones that survived it, because that’s going to be hard, and the whole swimming and diving program. Thoughts and prayers are with them.”