Landform Graphics

Designing a freeway includes quite a bit of thought about how it will look beyond the travel lanes. That's why we make sure Valley freeways have designs that reflect the history and natural beauty of the areas they pass through. 

The Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway is the latest reflection of that commitment. When designing the 22-mile freeway, ADOT took care in picking how sound walls, bridges and more would look, down to the lines, paint colors, landscaping and ground cover, including land-form graphics. 

ADOT’s Joseph Salazar was honored recently with a lifetime achievement award from the American Society of Landscape Architects Arizona Chapter.

Salazar, who has been with ADOT for almost 30 years and serves as landscape architectural project design manager for the Roadside Development section, said the award came as a complete, wonderful surprise.

There’s a lot of interesting content in our early blog posts, which is why we’re looking back and highlighting some of our favorites in a new series called, “From the Rearview Mirror.”

The SR 143 has undergone some reconstruction and work still continues, but that doesn’t mean the indigenous images and symbols that have long been a part of its landscape will go away.

As ADOT employees, we naturally get a lot of transportation-related questions thrown our way by friends and family... it’s just something that comes with the job! But, another question we regularly get focuses on the rock landscaping surrounding our Valley freeways. People want to know why we don’t just use trees and shrubs instead of rock. Others wonder why we landscape the area at all.