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DUCK CREEK VILLAGE, Kane County — There's nothing like a little peace and quiet to get away from it all sometimes. For folks in Duck Creek Village, though, there's too much quiet these days.
"My parking lot is empty. Everything is empty down the streets," said Rick Hanna, who rents cabins as the owner of Mountain Man Realty. "There's nobody walking. There should be snowmobiles. There's just nothing going on."
Normally, the town would be full of people this time of year — most renting snowmobiles, eating at restaurants and spending the weekend. But a massive landslide came smashing down on top of state Route 14 on Oct. 8 and changed everything.
SR 14 goes through Duck Creek and is the main connector between Cedar City in Iron County and U.S. Highway 89 in Kane County. Ever since the slide happened, SR 14 has been closed.
There's enough dirt, rocks and trees to fill a football stadium. But there's no highway, and no highway traffic.
"If we have to go around to (state Route) 20 and back up (U.S.) 89, it's a 150 mile detour," said Iron County commissioner Dan Webster. "Drivers are bypassing Cedar City, and it's having a huge economic effect on our community."
Fixing the damage won't be easy. Utah Department of Transportation Crews removed some debris, but there's a lot left. Early estimates were 1.1 million cubic yards of land came down.
"We're down to about 700,000 cubic yards that still have to be moved," said UDOT district engineer Jim McConnell.
Recently, UDOT received $10 million in emergency federal money for the project. But federal dollars means a slower process.
"It's just a few more things you have to get the approvals on," McConnell explained. "Maybe they're a little but harder on some things, but we're still working through that process and we're pretty well on schedule."
UDOT hopes to have a contractor in place to remove the rest of the debris beginning in March. The agency estimates having a gravel road open in June, and a fully paved highway finished by July 4.
"We don't have any customers. "Our sales on recreational vehicles have dropped to almost nothing. It's almost to where you can't survive." -Rod Ence, businessman
But by then, southern Utah tows will already be halfway through the tourist season.
"I don't know if we're going to be able to make it through. We might be out of business," said Rod Ence, owner of Loose Wheels in Duck Creek.
Ence's shop consists of a gas station, convenience store, and a snowmobile repair shop. He also sells snowmobiles, but not many of them have been going out the door this season.
"We don't have any customers," Ence said. "Our sales on recreational vehicles have dropped to almost nothing. It's almost to where you can't survive."
County commissioners have written letters to Utah's governor and state leaders asking for more assistance. Still, it's a large project that can't be fixed in just a few days.
"We're doing everything we can to try and get traffic access into the canyon back as soon as we can," McConnell said.
Residents say they understand the amount of work that needs to be done. They're just hoping they can last through it.
"Whatever we can do to help," Hanna said. "We're gonna go broke up here if we don't get something done."
