HILL CITY, S.D. (SD News Watch) – Hill City School District Superintendent Blake Gardner is trying to plan well in advance for major disruptions to student and staff transportation that will result from a $72 million project to rebuild 15 miles of U.S. 385, the only major north-south route through the central Black Hills.
The three-year project will include five separate complete closures of the winding two-lane highway that flows amid scenic lakes, giant rock outcroppings and dramatic ridge lines but which also has a high rate of crashes and fatalities.
Gardner calls U.S. 385, which connects Custer State Park on the south to the gambling destination of Deadwood on the north, the “backbone of Black Hills travel.”
The two-lane highway provides access to Pactola Reservoir and Sheridan Lake. The road is also a pipeline to Mount Rushmore National Memorial and Crazy Horse Memorial and helps fuel a regional tourism industry that brought $2 billion in revenue to South Dakota in 2021.
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