Infrastructure Week: Let us count the ways

EDITOR'S NOTE: It's Infrastructure Week 2019, and all week we're highlighting aspects of construction, improvement and maintenance that are part of Arizona's investment in state highways.

By David Rookhuyzen / ADOT Communications

Highway infrastructure is more than just concrete and rebar. It's what you drive on, over or through every day to get from Point A to Point B. Below is just a small sampling of numbers behind the highway system ADOT builds, operates and maintains.

• $22.4 billion: Arizona's investment in its highway system.
• 86: The number of highways and freeways ADOT oversees. That includes six interstates: I-10, I-17, I-8, I-40, I-19 and I-15.
• More than 6,700: The number of miles of state highways.
• Above 9,000 feet: The elevation near Hannagan Meadow along US 191 in the White Mountains, the highest paved section in the state. The uppermost section of State Route 366/Swift Trail on Mount Graham in southeast Arizona is a similar elevation, but it's near the top.
• 390 miles: Length of I-10 across Arizona, the longest continuously numbered highway in the state.
• 1 mile: The length of State Route 24, currently the shortest state highway.
• 22 miles: The length of the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway, currently under construction.
• 4: Number of tunnels on Arizona highways. They are the Mule Pass Tunnel on US 80 northwest of Bisbee, Queen Creek Tunnel on US 60 east of Superior, Rock Tunnel on US 191 north of Morenci and the Deck Park Tunnel on I-10 in Phoenix. The latter is not strictly a tunnel, as it is a series of connected bridges.
• More than 4,800: The number of bridges in the state highway system.
• 1 mile: The length of the bridges that make up the Loop 202 Red Mountain Freeway as it crosses the Salt River in Tempe, making up the longest bridge spans in Arizona.
• 900 feet: The height of the Mike O'Callaghan-Pat Tillman bridge above the Colorado River at the Nevada state line.

Watch for more on highways, bridges and other infrastructure that's part of ADOT's mission as Infrastructure Week 2019 continues.