Arizona State and Local Government Documents Collection

Bellemont is a rural, unincorporated community with a population of approximately 1,000 residents in Coconino County that has become a suburb of Flagstaff, where residents commute to work. Three roads ó Interstate 40 (I-40), Brannigan Park Road and Shadow Mountain Drive ó are used to access virtually all the private land north of I-40 at Bellemont. Frequent congestion from heavy truck volumes and subdivision traffic causes traffic delays and creates concern for safety and timely emergency response. The 2008 closure of the ADOT Parks Rest Area on I-40, just west of Bellemont, has also increased vehicular traffic accessing the truck stop and restaurants. Future build-out of the subdivision and potential commercial/industrial uses in the area are expected to continue to negatively affect the Brannigan Park Road and Shadow Mountain Drive intersection and the I-40 traffic interchange. ADOT recently prepared the I-40 Bellemont to Winona Initial Design Concept Report, which recommended long-term improvements for the intersection and traffic interchange.

Ultimately, this access management and multimodal transportation study will provide a comprehensive review of the Bellemont area transportation system and provide guidance for determining priority needs for future improvements north of I-40, including alleviating congestion and improving/managing access, and improving and evaluating multimodal access to businesses from residential areas.

The Ganado-Burnside Area is a rural community located on the Navajo Nation in northeastern Arizona. Ganado was formally established in 1901 as the location for a Presbyterian Church Mission, a school and hospital. Later the community served as a center to distribute various types of Bureau of Indian Affairs services. Today, the community area serves as a major center for housing, education, health and government operations. Also in the Burnside area, the Ganado School District recently established a new high school and sports venue to accommodate track and field, baseball, and basketball activities.

There are four main roadway corridors that intersect the study area: State Route 264, US Route 191, Navajo Route 27 and Navajo Route 15. There are also county gravel roads and private and community dirt roads that intersect SR 264, the main traffic corridor. Within these routes there is substantial multimodal activity generated from the area schools, medical facilities, transit operations, government entities, utility providers and social programs. The principal focus of this study project is to address the most critical transportation planning needs identified by the Ganado Chapter and Apache County. This will include, but is not limited to, a comprehensive needs analysis of multimodal movements and traffic circulation as well as safety issues for the project area corridors. The major product of the study will be a final report, which contains a Plan for Improvements. Taking into consideration received public input, the Plan will span over five-, 10- and 20-year periods, incorporating both roadways and the multimodal needs of the area.

The Ganado-Burnside Area Traffic Circulation Study will also be conducted according to a cooperative planning process that involves stakeholders that include public agency staff, elected tribal officials and tribal community members. Throughout the study, information will be presented to and solicited from stakeholders through individual interviews and to the general public through public meetings and other means of communication.

Planning to Programming Link development started with ADOT's multimodal visioning called "Building a Quality Arizona" (bqAZ), the 2010 Statewide Transportation Planning Framework Study created a fiscally-unconstrained vision for the state's transportation system in 2050. bqAZ led to "What Moves You Arizona?," the state's Long-Range Transportation Plan 2010-2035, which applied financial constraint to the vision, identifying anticipated revenues and providing a recommended investment choice (RIC) that indicates how revenues will be allocated to four different investment types: preservation, expansion, modernization, and non-highway. The third step, and subject of this report, is "Linking the Long-Range Plan and Capital Improvement Program," or P2P Link, which focuses on how ADOT and its primary business partners, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), Metropolitan Planning Organizations (MPOs), and Councils of Governments (COGs), fund, build, maintain and operate the transportation system.

The principal purpose of the Gila County Transportation Study is to identify the most critical transportation infrastructure needs within Gila County and recommend a program of improvement projects to address these needs. Transportation needs were grouped into the following elements: roadway, safety, pavement management, bicycle and pedestrian facilities, and transportation finance.

Arizona public school districts' dollars spent in the classroom. In November 2000, voters approved Proposition 301, which increased the State’s sales tax from 5 percent to 5.6 percent to provide additional money for educational programs. The enabling legislation for Proposition 301 requires the Auditor General to “. . . monitor school districts to determine the percentage of every dollar spent in the classroom by a school district.” This report presents our analysis of the percentage of dollars spent in the classroom for the most recently completed school year.

The Arizona Department of Transportation is the primary decision maker for federal-aid transportation plans and investments in non-metropolitan areas with populations below 50,000. However, ADOT understands the importance of consulting with local governments before, during, and after the decision making process to ensure participation results in improved transportation system planning, performance and project development. Therefore, ADOT has developed guidelines that outline the consultation process, and defines how and when outreach will occur with officials from rural areas. It is intended that this document is subject to review and revision every 5 years. In the event that Congress enacts new transportation language, this document will be subject to immediate revision.