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About the Sierra Nevada Passes
Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
The Sierra Nevada mountain range has 22 major paved mountain pass roads that offer travelers fantastic scenery, great driving and riding, and unparalleled opportunities to explore and enjoy.
Because the Sierra has such dramatic topography some of these mountain pass roads are closed all winter long, the pavement buried under snow deep enough to completely bury a large truck. And winter in the Sierra doesn’t coincide at all with winter on your calendar. The highest, snowiest Sierra Nevada passes are usually closed four to six months of the year. After a particularly intense winter the last pass to be cleared for traffic won’t open until well into June.
The Sierra Nevada range is big and rugged
The Sierra range runs north and south for about 400 miles (640 kilometers) between Tehachapi Pass, in southern California, and Fredonyer Pass, in far northern California. The mountains are about 40 to 80 miles (60 to 130 kilometers) wide and separate California’s fertile Central Valley from the high desert of the Great Basin, in Nevada.
The highest peak in the Sierra Nevada, in California, and in the contiguous United States is Mount Whitney. Its summit is 14,505 feet (4,421 meters) above sea level. Yet less than 100 miles (160 kilometers) away lies the lowest elevation (282 feet, 86 meters, below sea level) in North America at Badwater Basin, in Death Valley National Park.
Southern Sierra: bigger, tougher
The mountains are taller, steeper, more dramatic, and more remote toward the southern end of the range than in the north. Mount Whitney is in the Southern Sierra. Nearby Mount Williamson and North Palisade are both more than 14,000 feet (4,267 meters) high. Eight other Southern Sierra Nevada peaks—Mount Humphreys, Mount Keith, Mount Darwin, Mount Kaweah, Mount Morgan, Mount Gabb, Mount Tom, Mount Pinchot—are more than 13,000 feet (3,962 meters) high.
With such rugged and challenging terrain, the Southern Sierra Nevada has a lot fewer paved mountain pass roads than the central or northern parts of the range. South of Tioga Pass, in Yosemite National Park, you would need to travel 180 miles (290 kilometers) down the Eastern Sierra before finding another paved road that crosses the mountains.
North of Tioga Pass, in less than 200 miles (320 kilometers) you’ll find another 16 paved pass roads. Ten of those roads will take you from one side of the Sierra to the other.
How dramatic weather affects Sierra Nevada passes
Winter snowfall in the Sierra is measured in tens of feet. It is fairly common for a single storm to drop three feet (one meter) of snow overnight. Wind gusts over the highest ridges often exceed 100 miles (160 kilometers) per hour.
Check our Weather page to learn a lot more about the climate and seasons in the Sierra.
Seasonal road closures
The California Department of Transportation—Caltrans—works hard to keep most of the roads passable as much as possible. They do a fantastic job. Still, it just isn’t feasible to keep all the passes open all the time. When winter hits the highest most remote Sierra Nevada passes Caltrans just locks the gates across the roads and makes plans to come back in the spring with heavy equipment to reopen the highways for travelers.
Temporary road closures
Even the highways that aren’t closed all winter can be closed temporarily during and right after a big storm. Some of the passes are vulnerable to avalanches. Caltrans will close the road, intentionally cause an avalanche, then use heavy equipment to clear the snow slide from the road. These road closures can last from a few hours up to a couple of days.
Sometimes a winter storm can be so strong that driving just isn’t safe. Caltrans will close a highway to keep drivers off the road and prevent crashes. This often happens on Interstate 80 over Donner Summit. That highway is a major truck route. Heavy truck traffic and a winter storm are a dangerous combination.
Dry weather in summer and fall leave the Sierra vulnerable to large wildfires. Thick smoke can reduce visibility enough to make driving difficult. Strong winds can push fires fast and erratically. Law enforcement will sometimes close roads to keep people away and give firefighters a better chance to do their jobs.
Which Sierra passes are open? Which are closed?
So, with all of these challenging environmental conditions conspiring to close some of the roads, some of the time, some of the year, how does a traveler know which Sierra Nevada passes are open and which are closed?
In California, Caltrans is the single most important and reliable source of road condition information. They are the folks who decide when the roads are open and closed. And they do a great job of making that information available.
Try the Caltrans QuickMap at quickmap.dot.ca.gov. You can use it to see road closures, read highway information signs, view traffic cameras, and even see exactly where Caltrans snow plows are operating.
For the small section of the Sierra range that is in Nevada, look for information from NDOT, the Nevada Department of Transportation. Their interactive online road conditions map is at nvroads.com.
These passes are mostly open in winter
These are the mountain pass roads in the Sierra Nevada that are generally open through the winter:
- Northern Sierra passes
- Fredonyer Pass, CA 36
- Beckwourth Pass, CA 70
- Yuba Pass, CA 49
- Little Truckee Summit, CA 89
- Donner Summit, I-80
- Brockway Summit, CA 267
- Mount Rose Summit, NV 431
- Central Sierra passes
- Spooner Summit, US 50
- Daggett Pass, NV 207
- Echo Summit, US 50
- Luther Pass, CA 89
- Carson Pass, CA 88
- Southern Sierra passes
- Walker Pass, CA 178
- Tehachapi Pass, CA 58
What does “generally open through the winter” mean? It means that these roads are not subject to planned, seasonal, winter closures. Some folks call these “all-weather” roads. But that isn’t accurate and could lead to confusion. The roads above might be temporarily closed during a strong winter storm. They might remain closed for a few hours or even a few days after the storm is over. They might be closed in the dry season because of a wildfire. Or road construction. Or a traffic incident.
Check the Caltrans or NDOT websites for current road conditions.
These passes close for winter
These are the Sierra Nevada mountain pass roads that are subject to seasonal winter closures:
- Northern Sierra passes
- Donner Pass, Donner Pass Road
- Central Sierra passes
- Monitor Pass, CA 89
- Ebbetts Pass, CA 4
- Sonora Pass, CA 108
- Tioga Pass, CA 120
- Southern Sierra passes
- Minaret Summit, CA 203
- Sherman Pass, Sherman Pass Road
When do the passes open?
The mountain pass roads that are closed for winter don’t automatically open on the first day of spring. Winter snows in the Sierra are deep. Winter weather can continue to drop more snow well past when the calendar tells us that winter should end.
Caltrans begins to clear the closed roads when it becomes practical, based on current snow depths, weather forecasts, and what resources they have available. Generally speaking, this typically starts to happen sometime in April. And it takes weeks.
In 2019, Caltrans began plowing Sonora Pass on April 2. They were finally able to open the road on May 30.
Tioga Pass is the highest pass in the Sierra at just under 10,000 feet elevation. It is typically not cleared until sometime in June.
We publish and maintain a page that shows the seasonal winter closure and spring reopening dates for the major Sierra pass roads. This information was previously available on the Caltrans website. But it disappeared during a site overhaul in the summer of 2019. Our chart shows winter closures going back to November, 2010.
When do the passes close?
Likewise, the dates for closing the pass roads also fail to neatly follow the calendar. Caltrans closes the passes when winter arrives in earnest and continued attempts to keep the roads open would be futile. This typically happens in November or December. But it could be as early as October. Or as late as January. In some years with mild weather, Monitor Pass manages to stay open for most of the winter.
The best Sierra Nevada passes for motorcycling
By now you’ve figured out that finding a great road to ride in the Sierra is more complicated than just looking for twisty lines on a map and finding a day with a nice weather forecast. If you are unfamiliar with the Sierra Nevada it can be almost overwhelming.
Relax, we’re here to help.
We’ve ridden every mountain pass road in the Sierra multiple times, collected what we’ve learned and put it all together into this site, SierraMountainPasses.com. And we’re glad you’ve found us.
We’ve written individual articles about each of the 22 major Sierra Nevada mountain pass roads. We’ll tell you what to expect on each of those roads so you can decide which road to ride, and when.
If you just need to know the best route to get over the mountains when the weather is sketchy, we can help you figure it out. If you’ve got a long weekend and want to make the most of your available riding time, we’re here for you. And if you’re traveling across the country–or across the world–for an epic riding vacation we’ve got the insider information you need to make sure you ride all the best roads, see all the best sights, and do everything you can to experience everything the Sierra Nevada has to offer.
Find your roads
Have you tried our Find Your Roads tool yet? You can search for Sierra pass roads based on the quality of the ride you can expect, the scenery, or the region of the Sierra range you want to explore. Or, you can just browse all the passes to see which ones look interesting to you. Then click deeper to learn more.
And take a look at our blog. It’s got stories about some of our favorite rides plus some ideas on how to make the most of yours.
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