Video

Think back to 1984. You might recall that the United States hosted the summer Olympics in Los Angeles and Michael Jackson’s Thriller snagged eight Grammy Awards. It’s also when the Maricopa Association of Governments (MAG) identified the need for a West Valley regional connector freeway later to be dubbed Loop 303.

Some terrain is so rough and rocky that even heavy-duty machinery can’t break through. That was the case last Thursday when ADOT crews used more than 7,000 lbs. of explosives to remove roughly 8,000 cubic yards of material along SR 260, about 20 miles east of Payson.

On June 6, more than 300 soldiers with the 40th Expeditionary Signal Battalion returned home to Ft. Huachuca after serving in Iraq for the past year. These soldiers were welcomed by family, friends and community – but, many also were greeted with the fact that there is so much to take care after you’ve been away from home for 12 months.

If you drive Valley freeways during rush hour, you’re probably pretty familiar with ramp meters … They’re the two-light signals positioned at most Valley on-ramps that tell motorists when it’s okay to head onto the freeway. Ramp meters have been used in the Phoenix-Metro area for about the past 20 years and maybe you think not much about them has changed … but, actually they’ve recently become much more efficient!

The wildfires burning through portions of the state are destroying so much … from the scenic acreage that will be changed forever to the property loss and the lives so terribly affected.

Talk about a quick turnaround … it’s been just three months since a fiery crash destroyed the Mescal Road/J-Six Ranch Road bridge in Cochise County and already ADOT has approved a contract to rebuild and reopen the bridge this fall.

Crews are busy adding more than 80 lane miles of high occupancy vehicle (HOV) lanes to two Valley freeways – 30 miles in both directions on Loop 101 in the west Valley and 12 miles on east- and westbound Loop 202 in Chandler that will link directly to HOV lanes on the Loop 101 (Price Freeway) and Interstate 10.

The bridges over Pinewood Boulevard in Munds Park have been carrying Interstate-17 traffic for the past 53 years and now it’s time for some well-deserved reconstruction! ADOT has already begun the project that will rebuild the bridges and ramps on I-17 at Munds Park , an area just south of Flagstaff . Work started last month and is scheduled to wrap up by fall 2012.

When a new section of highway opens, we here at ADOT celebrate right alongside the local communities, citizens, contractors and stakeholders who all played a part in getting the road built.

In fact, ADOT goes to great lengths to make sure Arizona’s roads are as smooth as possible…even when that means walking hundreds of miles of roadway! To measure the smoothness of a road, ADOT uses a machine called a profilograph that surveys the road for any lumps, bumps or dips.

Over the past several years the soil under the Loop 101 travel lanes, where it abuts the bridge over Camelback Road, has been slowly settling and creating a depression.

Last week we gave a brief overview of how ADOT plans for future transportation needs through a three-phased approach. We covered the Visioning phase (if money was no object, how would we plan for Arizona’s transportation future) and the Planning phase (given that resources are limited, how should we prioritize the needs identified in the Vision).

In just 10 hours this past weekend, two bridges in southern Arizona were demolished in order to make way for something new. All it took was some good planning, plenty of patience from motorists, a few enormous machines, and a ton of work by crews on the sites.

Ever try to figure out how ADOT decided to put a freeway where it did? Or why some roads have wider shoulders than others? Well, none of it happened by accident. ADOT, like most transportation agencies, takes a three-phased approach to transportation decision making: Vision, Planning and Programming.