Landscaping

Drivers might have notinced the shoulders of Arizona highways are sown with flowers and other native plants. You have LeRoy Brady to thank for that. 

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.

Landscapers are transplanting saguaros weighing up to 5,000 pounds so they can be reused once the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway is complete.

Crews are making significant progress relocating hundreds of native plants, trees and cactuses in the path of the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway.

PHOENIX – When the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway opens, many of the trees, cactuses and other plants that will blend into the surrounding landscape will be transplants from the freeway’s path.

Crews have started removing native vegetation, including saguaros and palo verde trees, in the 22-mile corridor so it can be cared for during construction and eventually replanted alongside the freeway.

SCOTTSDALE – Drivers on the now-wider Loop 101 (Pima Freeway), where new lanes have been added south of Shea Boulevard, may also have noticed construction crews working in recent months to transplant large saguaros, other cactuses and trees that had temporarily been stored in nurseries near the freeway. Many of the tall saguaros have been around longer than Arizona has been a state.

What weighs up to 5,000 pounds, is more than 100 years old and can be more than a little prickly about moving?

Learning doesn’t always have to take place inside of a classroom, sometimes it can happen safely near the side of a freeway!

Plants won’t grow if they’re rooted in the wrong soil. That’s why ADOT makes sure its topsoil is suitable for good growth by testing Calcium Carbonate levels.

If you liked the list of five electrical maintenance tasks regularly performed by ADOT crews we shared last month, you’re in luck today …

Successfully transplanting a cactus from one spot to another takes more than just a green thumb…

Ever survey an Arizona freeway during a monsoon? If you have, you’re likely to have seen debris in the roadway, landscapes in disarray, damage and even flooding…

We won’t blame you if you see this green slope at the Loop 303 and US 60 (Grand Avenue) and think it's part of a St. Patrick’s Day stunt, but we promise this is no gimmick! The mound of dirt is green for good reason, albeit one that has nothing to do with tomorrow’s holiday …

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.

Who says constructing a freeway through a beautiful desert expanse has to spoil the view? Once the new stretch of Loop 303 opens this month, motorists will see for themselves that great care was taken by ADOT and its project partners to keep the scene as pristine and seemingly untouched as possible.