Adopt a Highway

Show your love on Valentine's Day with Adopt a Highway. 

For five years Melissa Owen has worked toward her dream of cleaning all 45 miles of State Route 286. In 2020, 121 volunteers made her dream come true.

Adopt a Highway offers an opportunity to serve all year round. 

If you're looking to make a positive contribution, you might be considering adopting. We're not talking about a pet or a baby, but a highway. 

When Bodo and Marie Diehn bought their cabin site near Payson in 1988, they knew they wanted to keep the drive up State Route 87 as beautiful as when they first saw it.

So the next year they joined the Adopt a Highway program, claiming mile 248 in the name of their environmental consulting company. They were in their 50s and often got their family involved, driving their Geo Metro up to clean their selected mile of highway. That's the family cleaning together in 1995 in the bottom photo. 

During the gift-giving season of the holidays, we have our own suggestion about what might be a meaningful present for you and your family.

When their son Manuel died, Sally and Nacho Ochoa adopted a mile of US 60 near Show Low in his memory. Though Nacho has also passed away, Sally continues to help keep that section beautiful.

A family cabin turned into four generations of love for the White Mountains and a desire to help keep State Route 473 clean.

Though Philip C. Brogdon has passed away, his family will continue to gather near Big Lake. But they are taking one more step to remember Philip and his love for "God's country." 

For 11 years the Jim Clark and his family have honored his parents by driving five hours to help clean up a stretch of State Route 473.

Adopt a Highway volunteers went all out for National CleanUp Day!

US 60 in Gold Canyon is cleaned by Bea Sanchez and her family in honor of her family.

ADOT Adopt a Highway volunteer groups raked-in – literally – hundreds of bags of trash from highways, joining groups around the country making their communities better.

With National CleanUp Day approaching on Sept. 21, I want to express my thanks to our volunteers and sponsors who consistently pick up trash along our state highways. These volunteers have cleaned up 1,672 miles of Arizona highways. You are indeed making a difference in keeping our roads litter-free.

National Clean Up Day is a day set aside for individuals and organizations to work together in reducing litter in their communities.

Calling all Adopt a Highway volunteers!

National CleanUp Day is coming up on Saturday, Sept. 21. This is a day set aside for individuals and organizations to unite for the purpose of reducing litter in their communities in every part of the world.

Read how love often leads volunteers to Adopt a Highway.

One Adopt a Highway volunteer group has been picking up trash for 37 years. Learn more about why they continue to give back after all these years. 

State Route 89A in Dewey got busloads of support from volunteers at the Glendale Union High School District.

Some Adopt a Highway volunteers enjoy the mountains while clearing roadside litter near their cabins.

We love our longtime Adopt a Highway volunteers and hope others will find inspiration in what motivates them, like this group from the Chinle Navajo Land Department.