AZ 30 ADOT Videos

[Max Rockatansky]

ADOT posted some AZ 30 concept videos on their Youtube Channel:

Interesting that ADOT actually captured MC 85 on their design map and used the old school black Loop 303 as their shield graphic.  Someone at ADOT obviously was a fan of the colored shields it seems.

[SSR_317]

Thanks for posting this thread! Looks like this freeway will be WAY too wide, and the video shows a total lack of any median barrier (a 16-lane freeway with a paved median and NO barrier except at grade separations?). I know this is just a design concept at this point in time, still, what were they thinking?

Oh, and I love how the first video just drops you straight into a cotton field!

[Great Lakes Roads]

Thanks for posting this thread! Looks like this freeway will be WAY too wide, and the video shows a total lack of any median barrier (a 16-lane freeway with a paved median and NO barrier except at grade separations?), but I know this is just a design concept at this point in time, still, what were they thinking?

Oh, and I love how the first video just drops you straight into a cotton field!

I was thinking about the same thing!!

[Max Rockatansky]

Thanks for posting this thread! Looks like this freeway will be WAY too wide, and the video shows a total lack of any median barrier (a 16-lane freeway with a paved median and NO barrier except at grade separations?), but I know this is just a design concept at this point in time, still, what were they thinking?

Oh, and I love how the first video just drops you straight into a cotton field!

I was thinking about the same thing!!

Really it looks like late 1990s graphic design, not the best look IMO.

[Sonic99]

This thing being 12+ lanes wide is just insane. None of the 303 has any HOV at all. They'll build it as 3+enter/exit lane just like the rest of it with an open median for future HOV lanes.

[sparker]

Thanks for posting this thread! Looks like this freeway will be WAY too wide, and the video shows a total lack of any median barrier (a 16-lane freeway with a paved median and NO barrier except at grade separations?). I know this is just a design concept at this point in time, still, what were they thinking?

Oh, and I love how the first video just drops you straight into a cotton field!

This thing being 12+ lanes wide is just insane. None of the 303 has any HOV at all. They'll build it as 3+enter/exit lane just like the rest of it with an open median for future HOV lanes.

Chances are there will be a K-rail down the middle, no matter what these preliminary graphics indicate -- and regardless of whether the thing is fully built out in the initial construction phase.  Did notice that the graphics for 303 south clearly indicate the stub-end for future expansion south to the purported I-11 alignment west of Maricopa.  After decades of eastern expansion around US 60 and loops 101 & 202, the impetus seems, with these plans and the U.C. South mountain 202 extension, to have clearly shifted westward.  It'll certainly be interesting to peruse the 2020 census data to get a preliminary view of any shifts in the regional expansion patterns.

[Roadwarriors79]

This thing being 12+ lanes wide is just insane. None of the 303 has any HOV at all. They'll build it as 3+enter/exit lane just like the rest of it with an open median for future HOV lanes.

I could see 5 or 6 lanes per direction near the freeway-to-freeway interchanges. Some sections of freeways in the valley are already designed like that.

[compdude787]

Yeah, I really don't understand why they're making the freeway so darn wide. It will just overwhelm freeways closer to Phoenix that aren't as wide as this one. And plus, I highly doubt that they're going to have 300K+ vehicles using it like the 401 in Ontario, so no need to make it this wide.

[Concrete Bob]

If AZ 30 is built east of the 202 and runs to the I-17 Durango Bend, I would be pretty certain that ADOT and Maricopa County would take steps to widen I-17 between both of its interchanges with I-10.  That is the only stretch of I-17 that hasn't been improved or widened since 1985, when Maricopa County passed the sales tax to build their freeways. 

[Roadwarriors79]

If AZ 30 is built east of the 202 and runs to the I-17 Durango Bend, I would be pretty certain that ADOT and Maricopa County would take steps to widen I-17 between both of its interchanges with I-10.  That is the only stretch of I-17 that hasn't been improved or widened since 1985, when Maricopa County passed the sales tax to build their freeways.

There are plans to widen I-17 regardless of what happens with AZ 30. Most of what might happen in the near future would be between 19th Ave and the I-10 Split.

https://www.azdot.gov/planning/transportation-studies/i-17-central-avenue-bridge-replacement-study
https://www.azdot.gov/planning/transportation-studies/i-17-near-term-auxiliary-lanes-study
https://www.azdot.gov/projects/central-district-projects/black-canyon-cross-roads