SILVERTHORNE, Colo. -- Summit County emergency managers are building an access road to provide another way to evacuate the Wildernest area in the case of a wildfire or other emergency.

Thousands of people live in the area, and it caused concern because of the limited access and wildfire risk.

“It’s solid trees, and the pine beetle has taken about half of them,” said Gray Pearson, who lives in the area. “And when this grass dries later in the summer and the rain quite, all this meadow is just tinder dry.”

But, Pearson said, there are only two roads out of the area, and they both meet at the same busy intersection.

“The bottleneck happens on ski weekends and the Fourth of July weekends and holiday weekends as it is, without an emergency,” said Pearson.

So last week, Summit County started work on inconspicuous access road over the ditch between I-70 and Wildernest road.

In the case of an emergency, traffic could be directed onto I-70, instead of the bottleneck.

“It was a very easy and practical way to open up another outlet. Time will tell whether it proves to be beneficial or not,” said Chief Dave Parmley, of Lake Dillon Fire Rescue.

Some residents, such as Pearson, said that the access path is not enough to evacuate thousands of people if a wildfire is burning the area.

“It might serve some small function, but I don’t think it’s going to serve the problem of massive traffic congestion,” said Pearson.