Colorado Gov. Jared Polis verbally declared a disaster emergency for the Elk fire burning southeast of Meeker in Rio Blanco County, according to a news release from his office.

The lightning-sparked wildfire started just after noon Saturday and had spread to roughly 600 acres by 2 p.m. Sunday, according to the Rio Blanco County Sheriff’s Office.

Sheriff’s officials said the fire, which is burning on a mix of private, Bureau of Land Management and state-owned land, prompted evacuations on both sides of County Road 8 between mile markers 11 and 16.

“Fire crews, along with air and ground support, are actively engaged in suppression efforts,” sheriff’s officials stated in a Sunday afternoon update. “Smoke is visible due to the hot and dry conditions contributing to active fire behavior.”

No structures are currently threatened, but residents and travelers are asked to avoid the area, officials said.

The governor’s disaster declaration allows state officials to direct more resources to fighting the wildfire.

“Fire conditions in northwest Colorado are at near record levels, and elevated fire weather and fire risk is forecast for the coming week,” Polis’ news release stated.

Another new wildfire burning about 80 miles south, near Carbondale in Garfield County, forced evacuations across the community on Sunday, according to fire officials.

The Ranch at Coulter Creek fire sparked near a subdivision with the same name Sunday morning, north of Panorama Drive, according to an 11:24 a.m. post from the Carbondale & Rural Fire Protection District.

The Panorama subdivision, the Ranch at Coulter Creek and areas east of County Road 100 to Upper Cattle Creek Road were under mandatory evacuation orders Sunday, according to the Garfield County Sheriff’s Office.

Those evacuation orders were lifted at 5 p.m., sheriff’s officials said.

The fire had burned roughly 115 acres with no containment by 4:30 p.m., Carbondale fire officials said.

The new wildfires are burning northeast of three other major fires still active on Colorado’s Western Slope.

The Wright Draw, Turner Gulch and South Rim fires have collectively burned 26,381 acres, according to estimates from fire officials. The Sowbelly fire, which was fully contained on Friday, consumed another 2,274 acres in western Colorado.

This is a developing story and may be updated.

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Burnham Yard, a former train depot linked to the Broncos as a potential site for a new football stadium, is not part of the 46-year-old Denver Radium Superfund Site, but it sits across railroad tracks from at least one property with existing contamination.

And at least one nearby parcel purchased earlier this year by business entities connected to the Broncos was once part of the Superfund site, according to a 2014 report from the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment.

Santa Fe Yard, which will be the future home of the Denver Summit professional women’s soccer team, is in a similar situation. That site sits across Interstate 25 from land that has ongoing mitigation for radium contamination and is part of the Superfund site. But the former railyard does not have any known radium underground.

Environmental experts, however, say the proximity to a radium Superfund site would not be a danger to the teams or their fans. Radium is a radioactive element that is found in nature, including underground in Denver, and, if mishandled, it can cause human health problems, including cancer.

“I can say definitively people would be safe at Broncos games,” said Thomas Albrecht, a chemistry professor at the Colorado School of Mines.”No Spider-Mans or Hulks.

“If they plopped a stadium on the ground right now, even a permanent employee would be fine. I would not fear it at all.”

Radium is easy to detect and there are proven ways to remove it, Albrecht said. And multiple federal, state and local environmental agencies would be involved if any radium was detected where the Broncos might want to build.

“The beauty of radioactive elements is radiation can’t hide,” he said. “It’s extremely easy to detect and it’s easy to detect in high precision.”

Radium remediation is expensive because waste material must be hauled long distances to approved landfills. But figuring out who would be responsible for any contamination lingering around Burnham Yard is to be determined, especially since the Broncos have never confirmed they are eyeing the railyard as the team’s future home.

“They may decide they don’t want the expense,” Albrecht said. “That’s a completely different issue. They’re completely capable of putting the stadium there and cleaning it up.”

The Denver Radium Superfund Site was designated by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1979 after spoils from the National Radium Institute and other radium mining, processing and disposal sites that operated in Denver around the turn of the 20th century were found scattered around the city.

Once the EPA declares a site as a Superfund, the agency has the authority to clean up contamination and pursue reimbursement for that work.

“In the early part of the 1900s, they didn’t have environmental standards and just threw out the waste,” said Benjamin Rule, the EPA Region 8 remedial project manager for Denver Radium Superfund Site.

While those radium businesses were shuttered by the mid-1920s, their radioactive waste has lingered in the city for more than a century.

The main health risk associated with the former radium businesses is residue from radium-226, a radioactive element that breaks down to form radon gas, which causes lung cancer with long-term exposure, according to a 2023 EPA report about the Superfund site.

The Denver Radium Superfund Site is unusual in that it is not confined to one location within the city limits. Instead, it stretches from Cheesman Park near the city’s center to the Overland Golf Course in southwest Denver.

The site covers 65 individual properties that the EPA subdivided into 11 areas, known as operable units. That’s because the EPA broke the site into geographic areas that followed the South Platte River and the rail lines through Denver, Rule said.

Only one of those 11 operable units remains under direct EPA oversight — groundwater beneath the Overland Golf Course at 1801 S. Huron St., which is about a mile from Burnham Yard. It would not impact any development at the former train depot, said Branden Ingersoll, a spokesman for the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment’s Hazardous Materials and Waste Management Division.

But two parcels near the potential stadium sites have designations that could limit development and land use. The EPA, as well as the city and state health departments, would be involved in any remediation and development decisions surrounding those properties with lingering contamination.

Atlas Metals & Iron, a scrap metal and recycling company at 1100 Umatilla St., sits directly west of Burnham Yard, separated by a set of railroad tracks. Between 1991 and 1993, 89,000 tons of contaminated material were removed from the property, but contaminated soil remains, Ingersoll said.

The radium in the soil is not dangerous to people as long as Atlas maintains its parking lot and its buildings’ floors, which serve as a cap to hold back the contamination, Rule said.

Atlas has a covenant with the EPA and the state health department to maintain the cap, and the site undergoes a review every five years.

In the most recent five-year report, published in 2023, the EPA noted that Atlas recorded increased radon levels in 2018 and 2020 after installing a new heating and cooling system, but those levels returned to normal after the company modified its system and repaired a radon-mitigation system.

Under the covenant, Atlas Metals must receive approval before seeking building permits or a change in land use. It also must notify the state if the property is sold to someone else, according to the covenant.

No ties have been established between the Broncos and Atlas Metals, but the scrapyard would be next door to any future stadium or entertainment district if the Broncos choose to relocate to Burnham Yard.

While Atlas Metals chief executive officer Mike Rosen declined to comment for this story, the EPA report noted that Rosen “is impressed by how his company has been able to succeed with a solid reuse of a Superfund site. He believes that there has been great collaboration with the CDPHE and the EPA throughout the cleanup process.”

The remarks illustrate how private businesses are able to work with government agencies to make land safe for people.

Patrick Smythe, a Broncos spokesman, said the team’s owners continue to study all stadium options, which include staying where Empower Field at Mile High is located and reviewing additional sites in Lone Tree and Aurora.

Another parcel acquired this year by a business entity linked to the Broncos — 1241 to 1245 Quivas St. — was part of the radium Superfund site but has been cleaned. There are no radium concerns on the property, Ingersoll said.

Burnham Yards also borders another area that was part of the Superfund cleanup — an alley between Mariposa and Lipan streets that runs from Fifth Avenue to Sixth Avenue. That site was remediated after 2,800 tons of soil were removed, according to online reports. There are no development restrictions, Ingersoll said.

There is no apparent connection between the Broncos and any addresses around that alley.

The property closest to the future National Women’s Soccer League stadium is the Home Depot at 500 S. Santa Fe Drive, which is across I-25 from where the stadium and associated entertainment venues will be built.

The Home Depot’s radium situation is almost identical to the one at Atlas Metals — as long as the parking lot remains paved and no one digs into the ground, the radium is contained, Rule said. The Home Depot also has a covenant with the EPA to contain the radium and undergoes an inspection every five years.

Still, Rule said he reached out to the new soccer team’s ownership once the stadium location was announced to explain the nearby Superfund sites and the EPA’s role.

“Santa Fe Yards are not technically on Superfund property and it’s not a direct concern,” he said. “But Home Depot is just north on I-25.”

Before a stadium can be built at either location, extensive environmental surveys will be conducted to make sure there is no radium or other contamination left behind from former industrial uses. Federal and state laws require it.

“The EPA carries a big stick,” said Andrew Ross, the Denver health department’s senior environmental administrator with environmental land use and planning.

Banks involved in financial loans tied to the properties also would want any contamination removed to avoid liability, Ross said.

“We’re here to help developers through these processes,” Ross said. “It’s on the developers to figure it out.”

The residents in the La Alma Lincoln Park neighborhood next to Burnham Yard are excited about potential redevelopment that would make good use of an old railyard, but they also are aware of all the potential environmental hazards surrounding the site, said Nolan Hahn, president of the neighborhood association.

“There’s always a concern that when you disturb the soil in the area that you can release toxic materials,” Hahn said. “We just want to make sure it is done in a way that doesn’t put us in more danger and respects the people of the neighborhood.”

Denver Post staff writer Jessica Alvarado Gamez contributed to this report.

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Ozone concentrations will make prolonged outdoor exposure unhealthy for people who are sensitive to pollution, including those with asthma or lung disease, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. People should avoid prolonged or heavy outdoor exertion between noon and 8 p.m. Friday.

The ozone alert applies to the Interstate 25 corridor from Douglas County to Larimer and Weld counties, including Denver, Boulder, Fort Collins and Greeley.

Ozone at ground level is a pollutant caused by chemical reactions between emissions from cars, power plants and industrial factories, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Ozone can trigger a variety of health problems, like coughing, restricted breathing and make the lungs more susceptible to infection.

“During Ozone Action Alerts, avoid rigorous outdoor activity during the heat of the day,” CDPHE officials said in the alert. “Prolonged exposure can cause long-lasting damage to your lungs.”

Smoke from wildfires in the southwest is also expected to cloud the Front Range on Friday and reduce air quality.

Denver’s skyline was already covered in haze at 8:30 a.m. Friday, obscuring views of the Rocky Mountains.

Hazy skies are visible across the Front Range today due to wildfires burning in the Southwest. Smoke aloft is expected to descend on Friday, increasing smoke near the surface & reducing visibility & air quality. Go to https://t.co/DHfbMTLUVB for updated air quality alerts. #cowx pic.twitter.com/HFGdDScfGK

— NWS Boulder (@NWSBoulder) July 31, 2025

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration on Tuesday proposed revoking a scientific finding that has long been the central basis for U.S. action to regulate greenhouse gas emissions and fight climate change.

The proposed Environmental Protection Agency rule would rescind a 2009 declaration that determined that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare.

The “endangerment finding” is the legal underpinning of a host of climate regulations under the Clean Air Act for motor vehicles, power plants and other pollution sources that are heating the planet.

EPA Administrator Lee Zeldin announced the proposed rule change on a podcast ahead of an official announcement set for Tuesday in Indiana.

Repealing the endangerment finding “will be the largest deregulatory action in the history of America,” Zeldin said on the Ruthless podcast.

“There are people who, in the name of climate change, are willing to bankrupt the country,” Zeldin said. “They created this endangerment finding and then they are able to put all these regulations on vehicles, on airplanes, on stationary sources, to basically regulate out of existence, in many cases, a lot of segments of our economy. And it cost Americans a lot of money.”

The EPA proposal must go though a lengthy review process, including public comment, before it is finalized, likely next year. Environmental groups are likely to challenge the rule change in court.

Zeldin called for a rewrite of the endangerment finding in March as part of a series of environmental rollbacks announced at the same time in what he said was “the greatest day of deregulation in American history.” A total of 31 key environmental rules on topics from clean air to clean water and climate change would be rolled back or repealed under Zeldin’s plan.

He singled out the endangerment finding as “the Holy Grail of the climate change religion” and said he was thrilled to end it “as the EPA does its part to usher in the Golden Age of American success.”

Tailpipe emission limits also targeted

The EPA also is expected to call for rescinding limits on tailpipe emissions that were designed to encourage automakers to build and sell more electric vehicles. The transportation sector is the largest source of greenhouse gas emissions in the United States.

Environmental groups said Zeldin’s action denies reality as weather disasters exacerbated by climate change continue in the U.S. and around the world.

“As Americans reel from deadly floods and heat waves, the Trump administration is trying to argue that the emissions turbocharging these disasters are not a threat,” said Christy Goldfuss, executive director of the Natural Resources Defense Council. “It boggles the mind and endangers the nation’s safety and welfare.”

Under Zeldin and Trump, “the EPA wants to shirk its responsibility to protect us from climate pollution, but science and the law say otherwise,” she added. “If EPA finalizes this illegal and cynical approach, we will see them in court.”

Three former EPA leaders have also criticized Zeldin, saying his March announcement targeting the endangerment finding and other rules imperiled the lives of millions of Americans and abandoned the agency’s dual mission to protect the environment and human health.

“If there’s an endangerment finding to be found anywhere, it should be found on this administration because what they’re doing is so contrary to what the Environmental Protection Agency is about,” Christine Todd Whitman, who led EPA under Republican President George W. Bush, said after Zeldin’s plan was made public.

The EPA proposal follows an executive order from Trump that directed the agency to submit a report “on the legality and continuing applicability” of the endangerment finding.

Conservatives and some congressional Republicans hailed the initial plan, calling it a way to undo economically damaging rules to regulate greenhouse gases.

But environmental groups, legal experts and Democrats said any attempt to repeal or roll back the endangerment finding would be an uphill task with slim chance of success. The finding came two years after a 2007 Supreme Court ruling holding that the EPA has authority to regulate greenhouse gases as air pollutants under the Clean Air Act.

Passing court muster could be an issue

David Doniger, a climate expert at the NRDC, accused Trump’s Republican administration of using potential repeal of the endangerment finding as a “kill shot’’ that would allow him to make all climate regulations invalid. If finalized, repeal of the endangerment finding would erase current limits on greenhouse gas pollution from cars, factories, power plants and other sources and could prevent future administrations from proposing rules to tackle climate change.

“The Endangerment Finding is the legal foundation that underpins vital protections for millions of people from the severe threats of climate change, and the Clean Car and Truck Standards are among the most important and effective protections to address the largest U.S. source of climate-causing pollution,” said Peter Zalzal, associate vice president of the Environmental Defense Fund.

“Attacking these safeguards is manifestly inconsistent with EPA’s responsibility to protect Americans’ health and well-being,” he said. “It is callous, dangerous and a breach of our government’s responsibility to protect the American people from this devastating pollution.”

Conrad Schneider, a senior director at the Clean Air Task Force, said the Trump administration “is using pollution regulations as a scapegoat in its flawed approach to energy affordability” and reliability.

He and other advocates “are dismayed that an administration that claims it cares about cleaner, healthier and safer air is seeking to dismantle the very protections that are required for those conditions,” Schneider said.

Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency at https://apnews.com/hub/us-environmental-protection-agency.

WOODSIDE, Calif. — Nestled in forests around the world, a gentle army of giant wooden trolls wants to show humans how to live better without destroying the planet.

The Danish recycle artist Thomas Dambo and his team have created 170 troll sculptures — including two in Colorado — from discarded materials such as wooden pallets, old furniture and wine barrels.

Twelve years after he started the “Trail of a Thousand Trolls” project, his sculptures can be found in more than 20 countries and 21 U.S. states. In Colorado, a troll named Isak Heartstone is located in Breckenridge and another, Rita the Rock Planter, is near Victor, south of Cripple Creek.

Each year, Dambo and his team make about 25 new trolls, which stand up to 40 feet tall.

“I believe that we can make anything out of anything,” said Dambo, speaking from his farm outside Copenhagen. “We are drowning in trash. But we also know that one man’s trash is another man’s treasure.”

An installation of six sculptures called “Trolls Save the Humans” is on display at Filoli, a historic estate with 650 acres of forests and gardens in Woodside, California, about 30 miles south of San Francisco.

“They bring us back to be connected to the earth and to nature,” said Jeannette Weederman, who was visiting Filoli with her son in July.

Dambo’s trolls each have their own personality and story. At Filoli, the troll Ibbi Pip builds birdhouses, Rosa Sunfinger plants flowers and Kamma Can makes jewelry from people’s garbage.

“Each of them has a story to tell,” said Filoli CEO Kara Newport. “It inspires people to think of their own stories, what kind of creatures might live in their woods and make that connection to living beings in nature.”

Dambo’s trolls don’t like humans because they waste nature’s resources and pollute the planet. The mythical creatures have a long-term perspective because they live for thousands of years and have witnessed the destructive force of human civilizations.

But the six young trolls at Filoli have a more optimistic view of human nature. They believe they can teach people how to protect the environment.

“They want to save the humans. So they do this by teaching them how to be better humans — be humans that don’t destroy nature,” said Dambo, 45, a poet and former hip-hop artist. “They hope to save them from being eaten by the older trolls.”

Dambo’s trolls are hidden in forests, mountains, jungles and grasslands throughout Europe and North America, as well as countries such as Australia, Chile and South Korea. Most were built with local materials and assembled on-site by his team of craftsmen and artists with help from local volunteers.

“My exhibition now has four and a half million visitors a year globally, and it’s all made out of trash together with volunteers,” said Dambo. “That is such a huge proof of concept of why we should not throw things out, but why we should recycle it.”

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Francis has listened to lots of music — the other day he took a deep dive into the catalogues of Steely Dan and Led Zeppelin — while rolling the 48 miles down Interstate 25 from Loveland, where he lives, to Denver’s Union Station. Then it’s just about a mile to his office on Broadway.

The 62-year-old IBM manager doesn’t miss the white-knuckle driving through narrow passageways in I-25 construction zones. Or the sudden halts as a cascade of brake lights go red in front of him. Or, when he looks in the rearview mirror, the dread of a big rig bearing down on him.

“I think that’s the beauty of it, is that my mood isn’t dictated by the drive,” Francis said. “Rather, I just sit and relax, have a snack and listen to whatever makes me happy at the time.”

But key to making the public transportation experience worthwhile, Francis says, is ease of use. And that’s where the Colorado Department of Transportation’s mobility hubs, the first of which opened in Loveland less than a year ago — with more to come in the next few years across Colorado — play a critical role.

“When I board the bus, it’s going to be a straight shot,” he said, “with no twisting and turning.”

On a recent weekday morning, Francis stepped on a Denver-bound bus at the Centerra Loveland Mobility Hub, a dedicated Bustang stop wedged between the northbound and southbound lanes of I-25 just north of U.S. 34. The bus rolled up, Francis got on and both were gone.

Time elapsed: about 30 seconds.

Danny Katz, a transit advocate and executive director of CoPIRG, or the Colorado Public Interest Research Group, said there’s no doubt the easy on-and-off that CDOT provides with these new facilities will add to the allure of transit. They may also bring some measure of relief to Colorado’s famously congested highways.

“Before these mobility hubs, the bus would have to get off the highway like everyone else and make multiple turns — some of them left turns,” Katz said. “In the best of times, it adds two to three minutes, and in the worst of times, it adds four or five minutes.”

Speed, reliability and frequency, he said, are the “key ingredients” of successful transit. And mobility hubs directly address the speed and reliability challenge by making the boarding and disembarking process seamless.

“It’s very train-like,” Katz said.

Opened last fall, the Centerra Loveland Mobility Hub was the first in a network of a dozen or so mobility hubs that CDOT will be rolling out in the coming years, mostly along I-25 from Fort Collins to Pueblo. A second hub in Berthoud, 10 miles down the highway, opened a few weeks after Loveland’s hub went online.

CDOT contractors broke ground on two more mobilty hubs in recent weeks — Broomfield/Thornton and Skyridge/Lone Tree, down in Douglas County. They are expected to be fully operational in 2026.

Longer-term plans call for mobility hubs in Castle Rock, Colorado Springs and Pueblo. On I-70, CDOT has hubs destined for Idaho Springs and Grand Junction. Another is in the design phase for Fairplay on U.S. 285.

CDOT executive director Shoshana Lew calls mobility hubs the “center of gravity” of Colorado’s regional transit network.

But it’s their connections to local, shorter-range transit options — be it local buses, shuttles, scooters or bike services — that make them hubs.

“The secret is to integrate into growing local systems,” Lew said. “We want to ensure that the buildout of the I-25 corridor is a multimodal one.”

Bustang ridership on the upswing

Bustang first hit the road a decade ago this month, taking passengers to and from Denver, Colorado Springs, Fort Collins and Glenwood Springs. The system, including a Bustang Outrider offshoot, has grown to 20 routes serving far-flung locations in the state — Craig, Durango, Alamosa, Lamar, Crested Butte and Sterling among them.

CDOT also offers seasonal Snowstang service to several ski resorts in the I-70 corridor, and it runs Bustang buses to Broncos games in the fall.

Bustang’s fortunes, compared to the Regional Transportation District’s, are stark. RTD provides bus and train service across metro Denver. While RTD’s ridership decreased from 106 million in 2019 to around 65 million per year today — the result of pandemic restrictions and a shift away from traditional commuting patterns — Bustang has gone the other way.

Ridership on the state’s family of Bustang routes — including high-volume, dozen-buses-a-day service along I-70 between Denver and Grand Junction and I-25 between Fort Collins and Colorado Springs — exceeded 350,000 in the fiscal year that just ended June 30, according to CDOT. That was up from 175,000 in 2021.

“The North Line is up to prepandemic levels,” said Heather Paddock, CDOT’s region transportation director for northeast Colorado.

The North Line is the Bustang route that connects Fort Collins with Union Station in Denver. It’s the route Cecil Gutierrez, a former Loveland mayor who’s now a state transportation commissioner, takes when he wants to catch a show or attend a meeting in Denver.

“It’s been a big success,” he said of the line.

Not long after the Loveland mobility hub opened last fall, Gutierrez said, CDOT doubled the service frequency on the North Line, which has 12 buses a day now going in each direction on I-25. North Line ridership has exploded in the last five years, from just over 13,000 passengers in 2021 to more than 92,000 in the 2025 fiscal year that just ended, CDOT says.

“If we want to make Bustang reliable and accessible, the frequency of the ride is always going to be a piece of that,” he said.

Lew, CDOT’s executive director, said officials realize the agency is always “competing for people’s business.” So everything counts when it comes to making travel as easy as possible — both inside and outside the bus.

Inside, there is free Wi-Fi service, along with bathrooms, power outlets and luggage bays. Outside, the service has to be constant and reliable, in the spirit of what RTD is hoping to provide with bus rapid transit on East Colfax, where buses will ride in a dedicated lane to keep from getting tangled up with other traffic.

Similarly, Bustang buses get to ride in the express lane for much of the distance between Fort Collins and Denver. (Express lanes are under construction between Berthoud and Longmont.)

That’s crucial to keeping the service running reliably, Paddock said.

Mobility hubs, she said, can range in cost from $3 million for a basic design to $25 million for something more ambitious. Centerra Loveland cost $15 million to build, Paddock said.

Calm amongst chaos

Using the Centerra Loveland Mobility Hub feels a bit surreal on a first go.

The station is located in the middle of I-25, a protected oasis inside a roaring interstate. You park your car or scooter and walk up a path to a lighted tunnel that takes you under the interstate. Branching off that tunnel are two more — one to a southbound platform, the other to a northbound platform.

The station has a sheltered bench and an electronic display that shows pickup times throughout the day. The Bustang bus peels off the left side of the highway and into the center median in a dedicated lane, stopping to pick up and drop off passengers. It then merges back onto I-25.

The whole process takes a minute at most. Paddock, of CDOT, said the new arrangement actually shaves 10 minutes off what it took to reach the Park-N-Ride that preceded the Centerra Loveland Mobility Hub.

Not all of CDOT’s mobility hubs will hew to the same design. The Skyridge/Lone Tree hub won’t be center loading, instead sending buses down traditional off-ramps for passenger pickup and drop-off before merging back on the highway. The hub will be tied together with a 260-foot pedestrian bridge over I-25.

Lone Tree Mayor Marissa Harmon said the hub will open next year in the midst of a fast-growing employment center and residential node in metro Denver. It will serve Bustang’s South Line, RTD’s southeast E-Line light rail and the Link on Demand shuttle service that connects to Lone Tree and Highlands Ranch.

The suburban city’s population of 15,000 is expected to double in the coming years.

“Our priority has always been investing in key infrastructure projects before they are needed,” she said. “Those rooftops are popping up quickly over on the east side (of I-25).”

Katz, with CoPIRG, said Lone Tree has done a “great job of creating businesses and residences” right at the nearby Lone Tree City Center rail station, helping to foster transit-oriented development.

Looking south, CDOT has plans for a mobility hub in Castle Rock, which has missed out on the transit game by not being part of the RTD system. CDOT says a location for the Douglas County town’s hub should be identified next year.

There are no completion dates set for the hubs in Colorado Springs and Pueblo.

Francis, the Bustang commuter from Loveland, said the $9 one-way Bustang ticket to Denver has been well worth it. While he could get to his job faster by car, saving time isn’t everything. By using Bustang, he saves wear and tear on his vehicle, keeps his gasoline bill low and doesn’t have to worry about finding and paying for parking downtown.

And there’s the peace of mind of not having to fight the thousands of other motorists on the road every day.

“I don’t know about the traffic and I don’t care,” he said. “This trip is not under my control, and I accept that.”

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Both fires sparked Saturday, and their causes remain under investigation, according to fire officials.

The Elkhorn fire, which started as a structure fire at about 5 p.m. Saturday and spread into the surrounding wildland, has consumed roughly 204 acres with no containment, fire officials said in a Sunday afternoon update.

Crews on Sunday were working to protect homes and structures near the fire’s edge, Operations Chief Nick Collard said in a Sunday morning briefing.

The fire is mostly burning on U.S. Forest Service land about 13 miles northeast of Durango, fire officials said.

As of Sunday afternoon, the mandatory evacuation area was bordered to the south by Stevens Creek and to the west by County Road 253, County Road 250 and the Animas River, according to the county’s evacuation map. The north and east sides of the evacuation zone extended into the San Juan National Forest.

Two additional zones along Elkhorn Mountain Road and County Road 253 were under pre-evacuation orders, according to the map.

Those are likely to turn into mandatory evacuation orders, county officials said.

Residents can call 970-385-8700 between 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. for updated evacuation information or view the current map online at readylaplata.org.

An evacuation shelter is open at Escalante Middle School at 141 Baker Lane in Durango.

A second wildfire burning south of Durango had consumed roughly 112 acres Sunday afternoon, more than doubling its size overnight with no word on containment, according to the Southern Ute Tribe.

The Rim Road fire prompted evacuations along and south of County Road 318, down to where the fire is burning near Indian Route 150, according to the county’s evacuation map.

Crews on Sunday were focused on preventing the flames from reaching a nearby oilfield, fire officials said.

Wells and natural gas lines in the area remained shut off due to their proximity to the fire, according to fire officials.

“Oil and gas operators temporarily shut down a few operations yesterday as a precaution,” officials stated in a Sunday afternoon update. “These sites were located closest to the fire perimeter. The temporarily closed sites are expected to resume operations tomorrow, pending a safety review by respective management.”

This is a developing story and may be updated.

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The wolf or wolves traveled broadly in Moffat County, from watersheds near the Wyoming border to the dry, rolling hills northwest of Craig along U.S. 40, according to the monthly map released Wednesday by Colorado Parks and Wildlife. At least one wolf was also present west of Meeker and north of Rifle.

Otherwise, the state’s wolves primarily remained in the central and northern mountains between June 24 and July 22, including in areas around Steamboat Springs, Vail, Leadville, Salida and Aspen. At least one wolf was active in the mountains north of Durango during the period.

The new map comes as CPW continues to monitor for new pups from the state’s three new packs: the One Ear pack in Jackson County, the King Mountain pack in Routt County and the Three Creeks pack in Rio Blanco County.

The Routt County pack produced at least four new pups, and the state’s already-established pack, the Copper Creek pack, produced an unknown number of pups this spring, CPW officials previously said.

CPW’s monthly maps show which watersheds at least one wolf traveled in during the previous month.

On Wednesday, CPW also released the results of investigations into the deaths of two wolves in the reintroduction program in the spring.

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South Metro Fire Rescue investigators said a train passing through the area on July 13 sparked a series of grass fires along the tracks, which rapidly spread and briefly evacuated the town of Louviers.

The fire was 90% contained Thursday, according to South Metro officials.

Crews spent another four days after the initial containment announcement securing the fire’s perimeter and dousing hot spots, including by use of a fire train that traveled back and forth along the burn area.

Douglas County sheriff’s officials confirmed the fire was 100% contained Tuesday morning.

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WILLIAMSPORT, Ohio (AP) — Sweat covers Isaac Barnes’s face under his beekeeper’s veil as he hauls boxes of honeycomb from his hives to his truck. It’s a workout in what feels like a sauna as the late-morning June temperatures rise.

Though Barnes was hot, his bees were even hotter. Their body temperatures can be up to 27 degrees Fahrenheit higher than the air around them. As global temperatures rise under climate change, scientists are trying to better understand the effects on managed and wild bees as they pollinate crops, gather nectar, make honey and reproduce.

They noticed flying bees gathering nectar avoided overheating on the hottest days by using fewer but harder wingbeats to keep their body temperature below dangerous levels, according to a study published last year. Scientists also say that bees — like people — may also cope by retreating to a cooler environment such as the shade or their nest.

“Just like we go into the shade, or we sweat or we might work less hard, bees actually do the exact same thing so they can avoid the heat,” said Jon Harrison, an environmental physiologist at Arizona State University and one of the study’s authors.

But that means the bees aren’t able to do what they normally do, said Kevin McCluney, a biology professor at Bowling Green State University.

“They’re not going out and getting more nectar. They’re not mating. They’re not doing the things that bees would otherwise do,” McCluney said.

Heat is just one challenge for critical pollinator

Generally, most bees are heat-tolerant, but as the climate warms, some experts think their ability to fend off disease and gather food might become harder. And habitat loss, increased use of pesticides, diseases and lack of forage for both managed and wild bees are all listed as potential contributors to the global decline of bees and other pollinators.

“If you’re not well-fed, and your body is intoxicated with pesticides and you have lots of diseases in your body, you’re going to be less heat-tolerant than if you were healthy,” said Margarita López-Uribe, a pollinator health expert at Pennsylvania State University.

Earlier this year, preliminary results from the annual U.S. Beekeeping Survey found that beekeepers lost almost 56% of their managed colonies, the highest loss since the survey started in 2010.

Almost all of the managed honeybee colonies in the U.S. are used to pollinate agricultural crops such as almonds, apples, cherries and blueberries. Fewer pollinators can lead to less pollination and potentially lower yields.

“It’s a very fragile system if you think about it,” López-Uribe said. “Because if something goes wrong, you have these super high-value crops that won’t get enough bees for pollination.”

Losing hives at Honeyrun Farms

Back at Barnes’ hives in Ohio, thousands of honeybees fly around as he gathers boxes to take back to his farm for honey production. Nearby, a couple of his bees land on milkweed flowers, a rare bit of plant diversity in an area dominated by corn and soybean fields.

For Barnes, who operates Honeyrun Farm with his wife, Jayne, one of the challenges heat can pose to his 500 honeybee hives is fending off parasitic mites that threaten the bees. If temperatures get too hot, he can’t apply formic acid, an organic chemical that kills the mites. If it’s applied when it’s too hot, the bees could die.

Last year they lost almost a third of the 400 hives they sent to California to help pollinate commercial almond groves. Barnes thinks those hives may have been in poor health ahead of pollination because they were unable to ward off mites when it was hot months earlier.

“Dead hives aren’t pollinating the almonds,” he said. “It’s a real ripple effect that stems back from the heat in the summertime.”

Sometimes the heat helps. Here in Ohio, Barnes’ hives last summer produced a bumper crop of honey as they feasted on nearby soybean nectar as the plants bloomed in the heat. Still, the lack of diverse plants for bees to forage in an area dominated by corn and soybean fields isn’t ideal.

And even the native blooms are appearing erratically, Barnes said. In autumn, his bees search for food on goldenrod, but those blooms are appearing later. And even then, he has supplemented his hive with additional food to keep them healthy into the winter.

“Every single plant that blooms is something that the bee can use,” Barnes said. “And every single plant is affected by climate change.”

Research that may aid bees is in peril

It’s only in the last decade that people have become aware of the magnitude of the pollinator decline globally, said Harrison, of Arizona State University. Data is limited on how much climate change and heat stress is contributing to pollinator decline.

“It’s a relatively new focus for biology,” he said. “I think it’s super important, but it’s not being studied a ton.”

The Trump administration’s proposed budget would eliminate the research program that funds the USGS Bee Lab, which supports the inventory, monitoring and natural history of the nation’s wild bees. Other grants for bee research are also in jeopardy.

U.S. Sen. Jeff Merkley of Oregon said America’s pollinators are in “grave danger,” and he’ll fight for the federal funding. Pollinators contribute to the health of the planet, the crops we grow and the food we eat, he said.

“Rather than taking bold action to protect them, the Trump administration has proposed a reckless budget that would zero out funding for critical research aimed at saving important pollinators,” he said in a statement to The Associated Press.

Harrison said his research on this topic would come to a halt if cuts are made to his federal funding, and it would be more difficult in general for scientists to study the disappearance of bees and other pollinators and improve how they prevent these losses. Not being able to manage these pollinator deaths could cause the price of fruits, vegetables, nuts, coffee and chocolate to jump or become scarce.

“Hopefully, even if such research is defunded in the U.S., such research will continue in Europe and China, preventing these extreme scenarios,” said Harrison.

The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.