A new Silverthorne Fire Station will not break ground until early 2024, a few months later than Summit Fire & EMS leadership had previously stated, according to a spokesperson for the fire district.

Back in January, Summit Fire & EMS said crews could break ground on the new station by this fall, but the fire protection district has just recently selected Denver-based Hyder Construction as the general contractor on the project, spokesperson Steve Lipsher said.

“This was just a more detailed look at what it truly was going to take before we can get started moving dirt and putting up walls,” Lipsher said. “It was our aspiration — and still is — to be pushing this project forward as quickly as possible.”

Summit Fire & EMS operates four fully-staffed stations located in Dillon, Keystone, Frisco and Copper Mountain but does not have an operable station in Silverthorne. The lack of a staffed station in Silverthorne has led some resident’s to raise concerns about emergency response times, especially when traffic is congested near Interstate 70.

The new fire station is expected to cost between $6 million and $8 million, and a contract with Hyder Construction is anticipated to be completed by next month, according to the Summit Fire & EMS webpage for the project. It will be constructed adjacent to the existing Silverthorne Public Works building off Colorado Highway 9, also known as Blue River Parkway.

In the meantime, Summit Fire & EMS has stashed an engine at a renovated storage unit at Buffalo Mountain Storage in Silverthorne in an effort to create temporary property-insurance relief for some residents at the north end of Silverthorne.

Up until last year, the fire district had a reserve engine station in Silverthorne, Lipsher said. When the engine was moved, some nearby homeowners’ insurance rates went up since they no longer had an engine stationed within 5 road miles of their home, he said.

“We heard from many of those residents who were upset because their insurance rates have gone up because of that,” Lipsher said. “So we’ve been working ever since that to find a place to stage an engine.”

But with devastating wildfires like the Marshall Fire and East Troublesome Fire destroying hundreds of homes in recent years, insurance rates have gone up across the state, Lipsher said, adding that he does not expect a major rate drop as a result of the reserve engine now stationed at the storage unit. 

“It’s not going to be nearly as much of a savings as they had hoped,” Lipsher said. “And it’s certainly not going to offset all of the insurance rate increase in the last few years, statewide and even nationally.”

The reserve engine is for insurance purposes and is not staffed for immediate emergency responses.