By Doug Nintzel / ADOT Communications

Frontage-road construction rarely gets attention within a larger freeway project, but that isn't the case with work underway in Goodyear, where a $63.5 million construction job is finishing the entire “south half” of the Loop 303 interchange connections with Interstate 10.

The big project still has a few months until completion. But on Saturday, Aug. 19, ADOT opened new and separate stretches of the north- and southbound Loop 303 frontage roads between McDowell Road and Van Buren Street.

Technically, these new frontage roads located next to Loop 303 (the freeway remains under construction in that area) still serve as the section of Cotton Lane between McDowell and Van Buren.

The frontage roads will continue to play an important role in allowing local drivers to make I-10, Loop 303 or other connections even after the new south half of the freeway-to-freeway opens by November.

In case you were wondering, the north half of the Loop 303/I-10 interchange, with ramps connecting the two freeways in the area north of the interstate, opened to traffic in 2014.

As always, we ask that if you’re going to be using these completed frontage roads or other roadways at the interchange, please continue to treat the area as a large work zone. Keep an eye out for construction workers. They have families who want them to get home safely each day. Be prepared for construction equipment, including large trucks, to be operating in the area.

This is a major project for ADOT, Goodyear, the West Valley and the entire Phoenix-area region. We’ll keep you posted on remaining major restrictions that are needed to complete the job over the next three months.

Enjoy the new frontage roads. The ADOT team is looking forward to opening the remaining elevated ramps and other Loop 303/I-10 connections to drivers very soon.

By Peter Corbett / ADOT Communications

Hollywood loves Arizona’s highways and picturesque landscapes.

Filmmakers have been bringing their lights, camera and action to Arizona highway locations for more than 75 years. Director John Ford sent a crew here in 1939 to shoot “Grapes of Wrath” on Route 66, and last year Michael Bay filmed scenes in Arizona for the fifth installment of the “Transformers” series.

Parts of “Transformers: The Last Knight,” which opened June 21, were filmed at Luke Air Force Base, a Valley junkyard and along Loop 303 and State Route 88. Paramount Pictures obtained a permit from the Arizona Department of Transportation to shoot its highway scenes (you can see the 303 ever so briefly at 2:14 in the video below).

“We had numerous action sequences that involved specialty vehicles, aircraft and pyrotechnics on ADOT highways,” said Denton Hanna, “Transformers” location manager.

He praised ADOT for its assistance and problem-solving while Paramount was filming in Arizona.

“I cannot overstate the importance of ADOT in the success of filming these action road scenes in Phoenix,” Denton said.

Arizona’s proximity to Hollywood, clear weather and scenic highways across a variety of terrain lure filmmakers here for big budget films, westerns, documentaries and commercials. Many of those shoots involve highway scenes that require an ADOT permit.

ADOT officials work with the Arizona Office of Film & Digital Media, to assist film and other media productions.

ADOT issues no-cost permits for filming along its highways with the understanding that film productions generate significant spending within the state.

The “Transformers” production had close to 300 people working at Arizona locations for three weeks, boosting the economy through buying meals, lodging, fuel and other ancillary spending.

ADOT’s requirements for film permits, including adequate liability insurance, safeguard the state’s investment in its highways and ensure there are no costs to taxpayers.

The agency issued 12 film permits in 2015, another 18 in 2016 and 12 already this year through this month, according to Jennifer Cannon, ADOT manager of statewide permit services.

ADOT tries to accommodate film productions even when a producer’s stunts get outlandish. One crew tethered a vehicle from a crane off the Navajo Bridge in an automobile “bungee jump.”

Every precaution was taken to prevent damage to the bridge or debris falling into the Colorado River, Cannon said.

“We don’t generally say no,” she said. “We try to figure out a way to make it happen.”

That can involve a lot of back and forth between ADOT and location managers to protect the traveling public and still get the shots filmmakers want.

ADOT is working with a filmmaker for a complicated shoot recently with multiple cameras and hundreds of extras marching along State Route 80 from Bisbee to Lowell in a historical re-enactment. Typically, the highway can only be closed for short intervals.

“Overall, we want to keep traffic and business flowing,” Cannon said.

A recent shoot south of Sedona involved short closures of SR 179 to film a bicycle rider near Bell Rock and Courthouse Butte. The footage is for a pharmaceutical commercial.

Cannon listed a handful of car brands that have recently filmed commercials in Arizona, including one on US 93 near Hoover Dam.

Of course, big budget movie productions get the most attention when they visit the state, spending millions of dollars and hiring local workers and contractors.

Arizona’s motion picture history covers a road atlas of locations for films like “Little Miss Sunshine,” and “The Kingdom” from a decade ago to “Forrest Gump” and “Three Kings” in the 1990s.

In “Kingdom,” filmed in 2006, a stretch of the Loop 202 was a stand-in for Saudi Arabia with highway signs in Arabic temporarily posted on overpasses.

In 1994, Tom Hanks as Forrest Gump was filmed running in downtown Flagstaff. In another scene, he’s shown jogging past the giant twin arrows at the Twin Arrows Trading Post west of Winslow. He ends his epic three-year super-marathon on US 163 in Monument Valley just north of the Arizona line.

Downtown Flagstaff and other Northern Arizona highway locations were also used for location shots in “National Lampoon Vacation,” the 1983 comedy starring Chevy Chase, that featured a humorously brief visit at a Grand Canyon scenic overlook.

Route 66 and US 89 figured prominently in two counter-culture road movies. In “Easy Rider,” (1969) Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper cruise on motorcycles across Northern Arizona and the Navajo Reservation before they connect with Jack Nicholson in New Mexico.

Musicians James Taylor and Dennis Wilson of the Beach Boys hit the Arizona road in a high-performance 1955 Chevy for “Two-Lane Blacktop,” (1971) a road movie that flew under the radar gun when it was released.

Going way back to “Grapes of Wrath,” Route 66 was briefly featured in bookend scenes with the Joad family from Oklahoma entering Arizona at Lupton and leaving the state on the Old Trails Bridge in Topock.

After filming “Transformers” in Arizona last summer, Wahlberg gave a shout-out to Arizona on social media: “Hey Arizona. Thanks for letting us shoot T5 here. It’s been awesome. Amazing, amazing state here.” (see below for his full message)

And that’s a wrap.

 

Bye Phoenix!

A post shared by Mark Wahlberg (@markwahlberg) on Jun 17, 2016 at 10:55pm PDT

By Doug Nintzel / ADOT Communications

Before I look ahead to progress on Phoenix-area freeways during our new year, I don’t want to let 2016 disappear too far in the rearview mirror. So check your blind spots while I take one more quick glance back at the accomplishments of the ADOT project crews who delivered some big results last year. Among the improvements you and I are now experiencing are the new Loop 101 lanes south of Shea Boulevard in the Scottsdale area, the Loop 202 widening project all the way out to Broadway Road in east Mesa and, not to be left out, the dramatically improved stretch of Loop 303 from north of Bell Road to Happy Valley Parkway in the northwest Valley. And let’s not forget the opening of the new Bell Road bridge over Grand Avenue. Each of these projects has made a difference for drivers across our large metro region.

The good news is that we’ll have a lot more to talk about in 2017.  As you might imagine, the Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway will receive its share of attention. In the coming months, Connect 202 Partners, the private development consortium building the freeway in partnership with ADOT, will set foundations for some of the 40 bridges that will be part of the project. I-10 drivers near 59th Avenue west of I-17 are now seeing work on access roads near where the South Mountain Freeway will connect with the Papago Freeway. It’ll take a lot of work and a lot of construction material before the much anticipated Loop 202 link between the East Valley and West Valley opens to traffic by late 2019.

The new year will see the opening of additional elevated ramps at the “south half” of the large freeway-to-freeway interchange connecting Interstate 10 with Loop 303 in Goodyear (the photo above shows recent work there). To refresh your memory, the north half of the interchange opened in 2014 and has made a big difference in allowing West Valley drivers to make the direct I-10 connection to or from Loop 303 north of the interstate. By the end of 2017, Loop 303 will be extended south to Van Buren Street, and the remaining ramps at the interchange, including some tall flyover structures, will allow traffic to make a seamless connection to or from Cotton Lane. As with those ramps, things are looking up for the movement of people and products across the Valley. In some areas, it’ll be out with the old and in with the new. That includes a busy stretch of I-17 in Phoenix that will be resurfaced with a new top layer of smooth, durable rubberized asphalt. In order to replace the old, worn pavement, ADOT will schedule a series of weekend closures along I-17 in sections anywhere from 19th Avenue near the Durango Curve north to near Peoria Avenue. The spring months provide the required weather and temperature range to resurface with the rubberized asphalt. We’ll be putting a lot of effort into advising drivers to consider alternate routes like State Route 51 or another roadway where they’re less likely to encounter heavy traffic. Stay tuned for updates on that important improvement work along the Black Canyon Freeway.

Before I head out for an interview, here’s my pitch for using extreme caution in highway work zones. You can be a lifesaver if you slow down, buckle up, avoid distractions and pay attention when approaching and traveling through work zones. Please think of that highway worker as one of your neighbors or maybe even be your brother or sister, uncle or a best friend’s relative. Give them a brake and observe our state’s Move Over Law. When you see those emergency lights, even from an ordinary passenger car, move over at least one lane or slow down to boost the level of safety out there on the freeway.

Have a great and safe 2017.

By Doug Nintzel / ADOT Communications

What a difference seven years can make, especially with a freeway like Loop 303 in the west and north Valley regions.

ADOT this summer is wrapping up final work on the last in a recent series of projects to upgrade Loop 303 from a four-lane highway still controlled by traffic lights or stop signs to a modern, access-controlled freeway stretching some 35 miles from Interstate 17 in north Phoenix to Interstate 10 in Goodyear.

The latest advancement is the combined widening of Loop 303 from north of Bell Road in Surprise to Happy Valley Parkway in Peoria, upgrades providing a new bridge and ramps at the Loop 303/Grand Avenue interchange and an entirely new interchange connecting Loop 303 and El Mirage Road.

That is now. But in fact, it was back in 2009 that ADOT broke ground on twin projects that would provide drivers with the entirely new 14-mile stretch of Loop 303 extending from I-17 to Happy Valley Parkway in Peoria.

Aerial view of Loop 303

The stretch now includes the Lake Pleasant Parkway interchange that many weekend travelers choose to use for trips to and from the lake, one of the northwest Valley’s top recreation destinations.

When construction started, crews traveled dirt roads that had been created for the sole purpose of access to the freeway work sites, since this part of Loop 303 had been laid out on parcels of undeveloped state trust land.

Heading out to a bridge construction site in the middle of open desert land east of Lake Pleasant Parkway left one with a feeling of arriving at a "Star Wars" movie set. It was a sight that only a relatively few number of people – mostly the construction crews – actually experienced since the work took place in an area that had been mostly reserved for coyotes and rattlesnakes.

Traveling along Loop 303 in that area west of I-17 provides drivers with one of the most scenic freeway drives in the Phoenix area – since development next to the roadway is still something left for the future.

Construction Work

Elsewhere along the Loop 303 corridor, where the old north-south part of the highway had carried traffic along one or two lanes in each direction north of Interstate 10 near Cotton Lane, another series of projects kicked off in 2011. The results are now stunning, especially for drivers who remember the old highway.

Mile by mile and stage by stage, the wider freeway was created between Interstate 10 and Bell Road by shifting traffic to one side of the corridor while crews advanced the construction on other side. The crowning achievement was the 2014 completion of the large north half of the freeway-to-freeway interchange connecting Loop 303 with I-10 in Goodyear.

Those who now make those connections and use the much-improved Loop 303 might remember the challenge and frustration involved in traveling on the old highway, when you of course wound up behind one or two large commercial trucks.

Safety is a top factor in advancing a freeway like Loop 303. There’s more capacity for traffic, ramps that provide access on or off the freeway at major interchanges and an end to the “at ground level” intersections.

But please remember that all of us, as drivers, hold the keys to safety. Please do your best to stay alert while driving and pay attention to signs and speed limits while not pushing the safety envelope. We’ve appreciated the patience of drivers while the work has taken place to provide you with the improved Loop 303, a freeway that truly is ahead of the curve.