By Ryan Harding / ADOT Communications

In less than four days last month, crews installed a 110-foot prefabricated bridge – Arizona's first ever – along Oatman Highway, about a mile north of Interstate 40 in Topock. As bridge projects goes, that's lightning fast. The video above gives you an idea of the speed.

ADOT administered this project for Mohave County, which received a $1 million Federal Highway Administration grant toward the $1.8 million total cost.

Assembling the elements in advance at another location not only saved $2.6 million on the project but greatly reduced the time required for construction. That greatly reduced how long Oatman Highway had to be closed.

By Tom Herrmann / ADOT Communications

The work won’t begin until this fall, and the new bridge and alignment for State Route 347 in Maricopa won’t be ready for traffic until 2019. But with this virtual tour, you can get a bird’s eye view of what the heart of Maricopa will look like before the end of 2019.

The two-year, $55 million project will dramatically change the way drivers move through one of the fastest-growing cities in Arizona. Here’s how:

• Northbound traffic no longer will have to wait for as many as 40 trains that cross SR 347 each day. A bridge will carry drivers over both the tracks and the current alignment of Maricopa-Casa Grande Highway.
• Southbound drivers can use the bridge to continue to the south side of the city, or use an exit ramp to go under the bridge toward Casa Grande.
• Drivers coming north into Maricopa from Casa Grande will take a new road north to Honeycutt, then travel west to SR 347.
• A new traffic light at Honeycutt and SR 347 will replace the current signal at Maricopa Casa-Grande Highway.

At the end of the project drivers will have three lanes of traffic in each direction compared with two lanes today, the same number of traffic signals and zero delays for passing trains.

The 200-plus Maricopa residents who joined us for a presentation about this project last week said they liked what they saw in this virtual tour. It about 60 seconds to watch each. We think you'll like what the future holds for downtown Maricopa.

By John Halikowski / ADOT Director

Grab some popcorn, sit back and watch the latest virtual tour of the South Mountain Freeway, the largest single freeway project in state history.

The six-and-a-half minute video updates the 2013 version that was completed to coincide with the publication of the Draft Environmental Impact Statement by the Arizona Department of Transportation and the Federal Highway Administration. I think you will be impressed by the sheer volume of construction planned along with the aesthetic features being implemented. Here is just a snapshot of what the video shows in key design modifications:

• Aesthetic and landscaping treatments reflecting neighboring communities.
• Direct HOV lane access near 59th Avenue from the South Mountain Freeway to and from downtown Phoenix.
• Six-mile-long shared-used path in Ahwatukee, located south of the freeway between 40th Street and 17th Avenue.
• Reduced rights of way required due to alignment changes.
• Interchange reconfigurations including a diverging diamond interchange at Desert Foothills Parkway and 17th Avenue, a first such interchange in Arizona.
• Sound walls to mitigate freeway noise.
• Pedestrian bridge north of Broadway Road to connect the Rio del Rey neighborhoods.

The video can be accessed at SouthMountainFreeway.com. You can also sign up for updates on the project at the same webpage.

The 22-mile-long corridor is expected to be completed by 2019, and will provide a long-planned direct link between the East Valley and West Valley, plus a much-needed alternative to Interstate 10 through downtown Phoenix.

This post originally appeared on ADOT Director John Halikowski's
LinkedIn page. He has led the agency since 2009.

By John Halikowski / ADOT Director

I want our employees whose office is the road to be able to go home to their families every day. During National Work Zone Awareness Week, it makes perfect sense to remind motorists to be alert when driving in work zones.

Safety is the No. 1 priority at ADOT. When it comes to work zones, vehicles speed by just inches away. We rely on motorists to pay attention and slow down when entering work zones, not only for the safety of our crews but for drivers and passengers.

According to the Federal Highway Administration, drivers and passengers accounted for 82 percent of work zone fatalities nationally in 2014, the most recent year with complete data. According to preliminary data for 2016, Arizona had seven fatal crashes in work zones, resulting in seven deaths, and 27 serious-injury crashes.

That’s why is doesn’t hurt to remind everyone, give our work crews a “brake” – drive safe in work zones.

This post originally appeared on ADOT Director John Halikowski's
LinkedIn page. He has led the agency since 2009.

By Caroline Carpenter / ADOT Communications

Yesterday we emphasized your role as a driver in helping keep work zones safe for you and your passengers. Today we're introducing you to the highways workers responsible for building and maintaining Arizona’s highways. These and other videos are appearing on ADOT's Facebook page throughout this week, and we hope stories from these and other ADOT employees drive home the importance of work zone safety.

ADOT strives to make transportation personal and asked highway workers across Arizona to share their personal story of work zone safety. They see close calls all the time and many have even witnessed crashes in the work zone. Everyone interviewed asked drivers to slow down and obey signs posted in the construction zone.

From Casey:

From Frank:

From Larry:

From Jaime:

By Ryan Harding / ADOT Communications

It didn't happen quite as rapidly as it might seem from the time-lapse video above, but as bridge projects go this job in northwestern Arizona was lightning fast.

After four days of around-the-clock work, the Arizona Department of Transportation installed Arizona’s first prefabricated bridge along Oatman Highway, also known as old Route 66, with the help of Mohave County and the Federal Highway Administration.

This innovative approach, in which the 110-foot bridge was manufactured in Phoenix and then transported in sections to the site in northwestern Arizona, saved a lot of time and cost in detours for local traffic and visitors.

In this case, the road was closed for only four days instead of weeks or months. Mohave County also estimated this approach saved $2.6 million in impacts to travelers and businesses, including work zone delays and detours.

The bridge lifts Oatman Highway over Sacramento Wash, a mile north of Interstate 40 in Topock, and will help prevent future flooding of the road.

Mohave County received a $1 million Federal Highway Administration grant toward the $1.8 million project, which ADOT administered.

You can see lots of photos from the project in the slideshow below.

By Steve Elliott / ADOT Communications

The photos above showing a snowblower in action don't exactly scream "spring has sprung," but that's exactly why this work is happening on State Route 67 north of the Grand Canyon.

A Fredonia-based ADOT maintenance crew is clearing snowdrifts – some as deep as 5 feet – from the closed highway a little early this year so it will dry out for crack-sealing before we open SR 67 for the season in mid-May.

When facilities at Grand Canyon National Park's North Rim are closed for the winter, ADOT closes the 40-plus-mile-long SR 67 south from Jacob Lake.

The North Rim averages 9½ feet of snow each winter. The amount of snow that falls in the area is why ADOT stations one of its two snowblowers there. The other is in the White Mountains near Sunrise Ski Park and Resort.

By Dustin Krugel / ADOT Communications

Motorists won’t be able to drive the South Mountain Freeway until late 2019, but now you can visualize that trip using the simulation above that launched today at SouthMountainFreeway.com.

It includes some key additions since we shared a popular simulation in 2013:

• aesthetic and landscaping treatments along the 22-mile freeway corridor
• direct HOV lane access to and from downtown Phoenix at the freeway’s western end
• a six-mile shared-use path along Pecos Road
• interchange reconfigurations, including diverging diamond interchanges at Desert Foothills Parkway and 17th Avenue. 

You’ll find much more at SouthMountainFreeway.com, including traffic alerts, a way to sign up for project news, renderings showing aesthetics and construction photos.

By Ryan Harding / ADOT Communications

Thinking about heading to Oatman, the burro capital of Arizona? Very soon you’ll be driving over a new bridge crossing Sacramento Wash to get there from I-40 in Topock.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. So what? Just another bridge, right?

Well, this is Arizona’s first prefabricated bridge. ADOT is administering this project for Mohave County, which received a Federal Highway Administration grant.

The bridge wasn't built at the project site but in the Phoenix area, where the contractor had space next to another ADOT project it was working on. This week, crews are assembling sections that fit together kind of like Legos. The innovative approach saves both time and money while cutting down on closures that would be needed to build a conventional bridge.

Instead of shutting down Oatman Highway (also known as Old Route 66) for weeks, the project requires just a four-day closure while the bridge is assembled.

Check out the photos above of the crews putting the bridge together. It will open in time for travel this weekend.

By Steve Elliott / ADOT Communications

Nothing tells ADOT's story quite like videos and photos. That's why John Dougherty and Mike Harris from ADOT Communications have made regular trips to our interchange project at Bell Road and Grand Avenue (US 60). With ramps opening Thursday connecting Grand Avenue and the new Bell Road bridge, their dashboard video above and their photos featured in the slideshow below illustrate how this project has improved the quality of life in Surprise and the entire West Valley.

Here are highlights as ADOT's work progressed:

April 2016: As major work got underway, this video explained what was coming, what the benefits would be and how ADOT worked with the community to create the best possible project and timeline.

June 2016: Time-lapse videos are great for showing how much progress has been made. This one showed bridge supports going up along Grand Avenue. 

July 2016: This time-lapse video highlighted girders being set for the Bell Road bridge.

Along the way: Our partners at the city of Surprise shared several amazing aerial videos of the Bell/Grand project, and getting them on ADOT's YouTube channel at youtube.com/ArizonaDOT allowed us to feature them on the ADOT Blog.

December 2016: After the Bell Road bridge opened, as promised, for the start of the holiday shopping season, this video highlighted the benefits.

What's next for members of our video/photography team? Stay tuned to the ADOT Blog, and we'll keep featuring their great work.

In addition to the photos below, you can see more from Bell/Grand and other projects on our Flickr page at flickr.com/arizonadot.