As one of the fastest-growing metro areas in the country, the Phoenix area in Arizona is nearing a population of 5 million people. Located within Maricopa County — the fourth-largest county in the United States — the area continues to see major infrastructure investment aimed at keeping pace with growing population demands. Among those efforts is the Arizona Department of Transportation’s (ADOT) Loop 202 Widening Project. The joint venture of Sundt Construction Inc. and CS Construction Inc. is serving as the general contractor on the project.
Most areas in the United States experience natural population growth. State planning departments usually keep this in mind as they plan budgets for infrastructure needs and other requirements. But the growth in metro Phoenix has exceeded planners’ expectations. The Maricopa Association of Governments has remained busy planning for the area's rapid growth.
“Typically, they design for what the growth projection looks like in 20 years,” Sundt Construction Project Manager Reece Green said. “However, we're finding that we're coming back to widen sections and add mobility within single-digit years.”
In the case of the project at hand, parts of the corridor were widened as recently as six years ago, with the outer segments widened 15 years ago.
The average daily traffic (ADT) in the project area is expected to be 111,100 in 2027 and nearly 245,000 in 2047. Traffic in the area is influenced by several key factors, including Mesa Gateway Airport to the east, metro Phoenix to the west, and Chandler Airport to the south. In addition, there are new warehouses and housing underway throughout the region.
| Your local Sennebogen LLC dealer |
|---|
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
The project area extends 8 miles from Chandler to Gilbert, Arizona, with boundaries from Loop 101 (Price Freeway) to Greenfield Road in Gilbert. The team is adding two lanes in each direction for 6 miles. One lane is being added over the last 2 miles on the eastern end of the project. Currently, lane numbers vary along the road. The west end has five lanes in each direction, while the east end has three.
Other project elements include:
- Widening 26 exit ramps from one to two lanes
- Widening nine overpass bridges
- Replacing one overpass bridge
- Performing a full reconstruction of the eastbound Arizona Avenue on-ramp and bridge
- Adding over 400,000 square feet of noise walls, sound walls, combo walls, and masonry walls
- Replacing the current highway lighting with LED luminaires
- Extending and upgrading the drainage system underneath the pavement
- Removing the existing asphalt pavement surface
On similar projects about a decade ago, ADOT began installing asphalt-rubber asphaltic concrete friction course — a mixture of hot asphalt cement and crumb rubber modifier. According to Green, the maintenance costs of the surface had gotten too high, so ADOT implemented new surfacing techniques called diamond grinding.
| Your local Atlas Copco CMT USA dealer |
|---|
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
On the Loop 202 Widening Project, crews will mill off the friction course on top of the concrete paving and then surface it with diamond grinders, which gives it a quiet ride. They are diamond grinding the entire corridor.
Due to the significant ADT and ADOT’s focus on minimizing traffic congestion, the team is laser-focused on completing each phase as scheduled, so they put together a sequence that is maintenance-of-traffic compliant.
“There are certain ways that we have to approach the work,” Green said. “For example, we can’t have consecutive off- or on-ramps closed because then it becomes a really long detour route for people in that area.” The ramps are driving the schedule.
Another challenge has been the as-builts. The designer based the design of the as-builts on previous projects, including some that were over 20 years ago.
| Your local Wirtgen America dealer |
|---|
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
“It’s been a challenge because a lot of those as-builts aren't what they appeared to be, so we've had to do lots of redesigns to accommodate the actual conditions on the ground,” Green said.
When this scenario occurs, the team has to hit pause and find a solution, which has a domino effect.
“We’re operating in a tight window, as we have just 60 days to take a ramp down and completely reconstruct it, including installing drainage and other utilities, paving, and tying into the mainline widening,” Green said. “When this occurs, we have to accelerate the solutions for the redesign and not lose sight of the 60-day timer.”
“We're working on up to four ramps at one time,” Sundt Construction Manager Matthew Denker added. “If something goes wrong with one of the ramps, then the scheduling on the next one is impacted, so we have to add more resources to ensure the project doesn’t fall behind.”
| Your local Komatsu America Corp dealer |
|---|
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
Denker said another challenge was traffic maintenance and staying within the guidelines of the spec to keep lanes open while leaving themselves a large enough work zone.
“Because we’re working in an extremely tight work zone next to active traffic, there's a lot of planning and navigating within the work zone to get everything done,” Denker said. The team has set up temporary concrete barriers, among other solutions, to protect the crew.
There is not enough room for all the raw material, equipment, and crew behind the barrier, which further complicates sequencing. The team is dealing with strict limits on when they can affect traffic.
“We plan and schedule traffic impacting work on an hour-by-hour basis. Sometimes re-sequencing the work isn’t an option, so we have to put contingency plans in place to maximize these short-duration work windows,” Green said. “The key challenge is coordinating the work in a way that maintains safety, which is our top priority, while maximizing the use of the available traffic restrictions and work area to complete the operations efficiently without impacting traffic more than necessary.”
| Your local Wirtgen America dealer |
|---|
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
| Brandeis Machinery |
Most of the work is taking place at night from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m. and on weekends.
“By the time you shut down traffic and set up the work site, the work window is very small,” Green said. “So detailed planning is essential for our success out here.”
Sundt was interested in pursuing the Loop 202 Widening Project because it had “everything that we do, which is underground work, moving dirt, building bridges, building walls, and paving,” Green said. “It fit us to a T, and we knew [we] could add value.”
Not only does CS Construction know the area well, as they are based in Phoenix, but their focus on highway and freeway management systems is not something Sundt has experience with.
| Your local Leica Geosystems Inc dealer |
|---|
| Laser Specialist inc |
| Laser Specialist inc |
| Laser Specialist inc |
“They fill a void for us,” Denker said. “It’s been a great partnership, as they have a similar ethos as we do.”
The two have partnered on projects in the past, and CS Construction has also served as a subcontractor on some Sundt projects.
The original construction budget for the project was $200 million. The owner has added an additional 6 percent worth of owner-directed improvements to the corridor since the project started. The funding split is 70-30 between the state and federal governments, with the state covering 70 percent.
Construction began on the project in the summer of 2024 and is scheduled to end in January 2027. At that point, the project will be substantially complete and will enter a one-year landscape establishment phase.
| Your local Case Construction Equipment Inc dealer |
|---|
| Burris Equipment |
| Burris Equipment |
| Burris Equipment |
The project is currently on schedule. Both Green and Denker attribute that to the crew.
“It’s driven by the personnel on the project,” Denker said.
“They're gritty,” Green added. “That's our tagline: skill, grit, and purpose. And they have skill, they have grit, and their purpose is to deliver. We're all employee owners, so we hold everybody accountable. And they are the backbone of the company.”
When the project is completed, drivers in the growing Phoenix metro area will experience less congestion and improved traffic flow. The beautification of the corridor aims to make the ride more pleasant.
| Your local Gomaco dealer |
|---|
| Fabick CAT/MO |
| Fabick CAT/MO |
| Fabick CAT/MO |
- Owner: Arizona Department of Transportation
- General Contractors: Sundt Construction Inc., Tempe, Arizona; CS Construction Inc., Phoenix, Arizona
- Designers: TYPSA (AZTEC Engineering), Phoenix; Ethos Engineering, Tempe; NFra Inc., Phoenix; Stanley Consultants, Phoenix; Corral Design Group, Phoenix
