
We invite you to browse what Lockwood can provide to locals and residents of Billings. From the Lockwood community to school and state park, Lockwood has a bright future ahead. As we promote Lockwood, we also have many resources that enhance the Billings and surrounding Yellowstone County area and intend to promote Lockwood Businesses, Services and Products. Thank you for visiting us online as we grow an online presence. "This is something we're definitely going to feel the impacts of for the next several years," Goonan said.Interstate 90 will be widening from 2 to 3 lanes in both directions from Lockwood’s Johnson lane to 27th Stree exit in Billings in the near future.

Kelly Goonan, an associate professor at Southern Utah University and an expert in national parks and recreation management, said rebuilding will be a long process. Yellowstone Superintendent Cam Sholly said assessment teams won't be able to tally the damage until next week. Meantime, as the waters recede, parks officials are turning their attention to the massive effort of rebuilding many miles of ruined roads and, possibly, hundreds of washed-out bridges, many of them built for backcountry hikers. We're just hoping that we can get back out there relatively soon."

You just hate seeing stuff like that in the community. "We're definitely a resilient company, we've got a very tough crew," Sipp said. It's a blow not unlike how COVID-19 temporarily shut down Yellowstone two years ago, reducing the park's June 2020 tourist visits by about one-third before they rebounded over the rest of that summer. "This is an 80% to 100% loss of business during the high season."įlying Pig Adventures, a Gardiner-based business that guides rafting trips on the Yellowstone River, will need to rely more on tourists staying in Montana now that roads into the park are impassible, co-owner Patrick Sipp said Wednesday. "The summer that we prepared for is not at all similar to the summer that we're going to have," she said. Now, with the road from Gardiner into northern Yellowstone washed out, the wildlife is still there but it's out of reach to McGary and her guide service, In Our Nature, is suddenly in trouble. She'd seen more 20 grizzlies some days this year.

The season had started well for Cara McGary, who guides groups through the Lamar Valley to see wolves, bison, elk and bears. The wave of tourists doesn't abate until fall, and June is typically one of Yellowstone's busiest months. More than 4 million visitors were tallied by the park last year. The rains hit just as area hotels filled up in recent weeks with summer tourists. Park officials say the northern half of the park is likely to remain closed all summer, a devastating blow to the local economies that rely on tourism. "These things are going to happen, and they're going to happen probably a lot more intensely." Businesses hit hard "We certainly know that climate change is causing more natural disasters, more fires, bigger fires and more floods and bigger floods," said Robert Manning, a retired University of Vermont professor of environment and natural resources. While the Yellowstone flooding is rare, it is the type of event that is becoming more common as the planet warms, experts said.

And it diverted the creek, and the water started rolling in the back, broke out a basement window and started filling up my basement," Pat Ruzich said. "We thought we had it, and then a bridge went out.
