Scott Harrison
EL PASO COUNTY, Colo. (KRDO) — From a road and driver perspective, two noteworthy changes have been made since last year at Rainbow Falls, a popular tourist attraction just west of Manitou Springs along Serpentine Drive.
First, as previously reported by KRDO 13’s The Road Warrior, The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT) and the county teamed up last fall to repave a badly deteriorating segment of the drive in front of the Falls entrance.
Then, recently, the county built a parking space for disabled visitors that meets federal standards and provides easier access to the area’s scenic beauty; the parking space requires advance registration.
Rainbow Falls opened for the summer season at 9 a.m. Friday.
For the second straight year, visitors must pay $20 to use an upper parking lot on Higginbotham Road and take a shuttle bus to and from the Falls entrance.
The county closed the attraction’s nine-space parking lot in 2021, 2022 and 2023 after some vehicles sustained minor damage from falling rocks on cliffs above, and the attraction was open only for special event tours in 2023.
Last year, with the cooperation of Adventures Out West — operators of a nearby zipline business — the county opened a parking lot above the falls and began the shuttle service.
‘We’ve created a safe area up above for people to park in that area,” said Todd Marts, executive director of El Paso County Parks. “They pick up visitors and bring them back up. Last year, we we learned a few things and some things were different. It worked really well by the end of the season.”
However, officials have yet to resolve the rockfall problem.
“We did an assessment that came up with a lot of different solutions,” Marts explained. “One of them was to try to fix the rockfall, and it was it was going to be very expensive. We learned, through an assessment, it was upwards of $500,000 up to $1 million for nine parking spots.”
He said that’s how much it would cost to place netting over the surrounding cliffs — similar to the method used on cliffs along US 24 in nearby Ute Pass.
The county also installed rock barriers to protect visitors inside the attraction from falling rocks, and to control erosion.
Visitors are asked to reserve their parking spots a week in advance.
“We vary from 100 to a couple hundred visitors a day, sometimes,” Marts said. “It depends on on the weather and the season. But it gets up to 200, 300 people.”
Manitou Springs officials eventually want to repave its section of Serpentine Drive below the Falls entrance — they chip-sealed it for stability last year — and extend its Creek Walk trail to the Falls entrance.
The attraction’s summer hours are from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m., May through September; the county reduced hours to better prevent graffiti and other vandalism from people who sneak into the Falls after hours, even in the presence of surveillance cameras.
In fact, The Road Warrior saw two men sneaking into the Falls during Friday morning live reports.
Elida Hoyle, of Tampa, Florida, was one of the first visitors to arrive Friday, just before 11 a.m.; it was her first trip to the Falls.
“I do not drive,” she said. “I do not have a car. I came from Lyft. The Lyft let me off down the hill a little bit. I thought this would be a very Colorado area — the essence of Colorado.”
For more information about Rainbow Falls, visit: https://communityservices.elpasoco.com/parks-and-recreation/rainbow-falls-historic-site/#1510677560407-ff8cfff5-69b253a9-430583b8-3b07744b-2837.
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