Namesake | Harvey Bell |
---|---|
Type | Arterial street |
Owner | Maricopa County and the cities of Surprise, Peoria, Glendale, Phoenix, and Scottsdale |
Length | 34.6 mi (55.7 km) [1] 1.4 mi (2.25 km) gap in Scottsdale [1] |
Location | Phoenix metropolitan area |
West end | Sun Valley Parkway in Surprise 33°38′18″N112°27′36″W / 33.63833°N 112.46000°W |
East end | McDowell Mountain Ranch Road in Scottsdale 33°38′20″N111°50′40″W / 33.63889°N 111.84444°W |
North | Union Hills Drive (18600 North) |
South | Greenway Road (15400 North) |
Construction | |
Completion | mid-1970s (present alignment) [2] |
Bell Road is a major east-west arterial road in the northern Phoenix, Arizona metropolitan area. [3] It is one of the few roadways to cross the Agua Fria River in the northwestern part of the metro area, providing a vital link between the growing suburb of Surprise with Phoenix. As a result, the portion of Bell Road passing through Surprise and Sun City is the busiest arterial road in the state of Arizona. [4]
The road is named for farmer Harvey Bell, who, together with James Shea, formed in 1916 the Paradise Verde Irrigation District. [5] [6]
The street lies at the 17000 North alignment of the Maricopa County grid system. [7] At its eastern terminus, the main segment of Bell Road, approximately 31 miles (50 km) in length, begins at the corporate boundaries of Phoenix and Scottsdale at its intersection with Scottsdale Road. Traveling west, the road intersects State Route 51 and Interstate 17 in Phoenix, the Loop 101 (Agua Fria Freeway) in Peoria, and Grand Avenue and Loop 303 in Surprise. West of the Beardsley Canal, the roadway curves around the White Tank Mountain Regional Park, becoming the Sun Valley Parkway.
East of 66th Street, Bell Road takes a southeasterly bend and, at its intersection with Scottsdale Road, becomes Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard, named in recognition of the architect and designer. This alignment was built in the mid-1970s during the construction of the CAP canal, which Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard parallels. [2] In this area of Scottsdale, a non-contiguous segment of Bell Road approximately 3.7 miles (6.0 km) long exists north of Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard, including an intersection with the Pima Freeway (Loop 101).
East of the McDowell Mountains, the Bell Road alignment forms the northern boundary of the city of Fountain Hills.
Prominent locations on or near Bell Road include the Scottsdale Municipal Airport, Turf Paradise, Arrowhead Towne Center and the Peoria Sports Complex. Bell Road also forms the northern boundary of the original town site of Surprise. [8]
The entire road is in Maricopa County.
Location | mi [1] | km | Destinations | Notes | |||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Surprise | 0.00 | 0.00 | Sun Valley Parkway west | Continuation beyond western end | |||
McMicken Dam; western end of Bell Rd. | |||||||
2.50 | 4.02 | Loop 303 (Bob Stump Memorial Parkway) | SPUI; exit 116 on Loop 303 | ||||
6.40 | 10.30 | US 60 (Grand Avenue) | Interchange | ||||
Peoria–Glendale line | 12.90 | 20.76 | Loop 101 (Agua Fria Freeway) | SPUI; exit 14 on Loop 101 | |||
Phoenix | 19.90 | 32.03 | I-17 (Black Canyon Freeway) – Tucson, Flagstaff | Diamond interchange with service roads; exit 212 on I-17 | |||
26.40 | 42.49 | SR 51 | SPUI; exit 13 on SR 51 | ||||
30.90 | 49.73 | Scottsdale Road / Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard east | Road name transitions to Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard | ||||
Gap in route; connection made via 1.4 miles (2.25 km) of Frank Lloyd Wright Boulevard and Greenway–Hayden Loop [1] | |||||||
Scottsdale | 0.00 | 0.00 | Hayden Road north / Greenway-Hayden Loop south | ||||
1.00 | 1.61 | Loop 101 (Pima Freeway) | Exit 38 on Loop 101; indirect northbound access via service roads | ||||
3.70 | 5.95 | McDowell Mountain Ranch Road south | Continuation beyond eastern end | ||||
1.000 mi = 1.609 km; 1.000 km = 0.621 mi
|
Interstate 17 (I-17) is a north–south Interstate Highway located entirely within the US state of Arizona. I-17's southern terminus lies in Phoenix, at I-10/US 60 and its northern terminus is in Flagstaff, at Milton Road north of I-40.
Peoria is a city in Maricopa and Yavapai counties in the U.S. state of Arizona. Most of the city is located in Maricopa County, while a portion of it in the north is in Yavapai County. It is a major suburb of Phoenix. As of the 2020 census, the population of Peoria was 190,985, up from 154,065 in 2010. It is the sixth-largest city in Arizona in land area and the ninth-largest in population. It was named after Peoria, Illinois. The word peoria is a corruption of the Miami-Illinois word for "prairie fire". It is the spring training home of the San Diego Padres and Seattle Mariners, who share the Peoria Sports Complex.
The Phoenix metropolitan area, also known as the Valley of the Sun, the Salt River Valley, metro Phoenix, or The Valley, is the largest metropolitan statistical area in the Southwestern United States, with its largest principal city being the city of Phoenix. It includes much of central Arizona. The United States Office of Management and Budget designates the area as the Phoenix–Mesa–Chandler Metropolitan Statistical Area (MSA), defining it as Maricopa and Pinal counties. It anchors the Arizona Sun Corridor megaregion along with the second-most populous metropolitan area in the state, the Tucson metropolitan area. The gross domestic product of the Phoenix metropolitan area was $255 billion in 2018, 16th highest amongst metro areas in the United States.
Arizona State Route 51 (SR 51), also known as the Piestewa Freeway, is a numbered state highway in Phoenix, Arizona. It connects Interstate 10 and Loop 202 just outside Downtown Phoenix with Loop 101 on the north side of Phoenix, making it one of the area's major freeways. It is a largely north–south route and is known for traversing the Piestewa Peak Recreation Area. The peak was named after Lori Piestewa, the first Native American woman to die in combat in the U.S. military. Prior to this time, the freeway was known as the Squaw Peak Parkway, a name considered offensive by Native Americans. Rapid growth and increased traffic demand on the east side of Metro Phoenix made the Piestewa Freeway necessary.
Arizona State Route 101 or Loop 101 is a semi-beltway looping around the Phoenix Metropolitan Area in central Arizona, United States. It connects several suburbs of Phoenix, including Tolleson, Glendale, Peoria, Scottsdale, Mesa, Tempe, and Chandler. Construction began in the late-1980s and was completed in 2002.
Arizona State Route 202 (SR 202) or Loop 202 (202L) is a semi-beltway circling the eastern and southern areas of the Phoenix metropolitan area in central Maricopa County, Arizona. It traverses the eastern end and the southern end of the city of Phoenix, in addition to the cities of Tempe, Mesa, Chandler, and Gilbert, and is a vital route in the metropolitan area freeway system. Loop 202 has three officially designated sections along its route; the Red Mountain Freeway, the SanTan Freeway, and the Congressman Ed Pastor Freeway, also known as the South Mountain Freeway. The Red Mountain Freeway runs from the Mini Stack Interchange with Interstate 10 (I-10) and State Route 51 (SR 51) in Phoenix to the SuperRedTan Interchange with U.S. Route 60 (US 60) in Mesa. The SanTan Freeway runs from there to an interchange with Interstate 10 (I-10) in Chandler. The Congressman Ed Pastor Freeway runs from there to I-10 in western Phoenix.
Lake Pleasant Regional Park is a large outdoors recreation area straddling the Maricopa and Yavapai county border northwest of Phoenix, Arizona. The park is located within the municipal boundaries of Peoria, Arizona, and serves as a major recreation hub for the northwest Phoenix metropolitan area.
The Valley Metro Regional Public Transportation Authority, more popularly known as Valley Metro, is the unified public brand of the regional transit system for the Phoenix metropolitan area. Within the system, it is divided between Valley Metro Bus, which runs all bus operations, Valley Metro Rail, which is responsible for light rail and streetcar operations in the Valley. In 2023, the combined bus and rail system had a ridership of 36,374,000, or about 122,600 per weekday as of the first quarter of 2024.
Arizona State Route 143, also known as SR 143 and the Hohokam Expressway, is a north–south and access-controlled freeway in Maricopa County, Arizona, that runs from a junction with Interstate 10 at 48th Street in Phoenix to McDowell Road. The only other major junction along the 3.93-mile (6.32 km) route is with Loop 202, which is located one half-mile south of McDowell Road and the northern terminus.
In the U.S. state of Arizona, Interstate 10 (I‑10), the major east–west Interstate Highway in the United States Sun Belt, runs east from California, enters Arizona near the town of Ehrenberg and continues through Phoenix and Tucson and exits at the border with New Mexico near San Simon. The highway also runs through the cities of Casa Grande, Eloy, and Marana. Segments of the highway are referred to as either the Papago Freeway, Inner Loop, or Maricopa Freeway within the Phoenix area and the Pearl Harbor Memorial Highway outside metro Phoenix.
Arizona State Route 303 or Loop 303, also known as the Bob Stump Memorial Parkway, is a freeway that serves the west part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. The freeway, originally a two-lane rural highway, was maintained by Maricopa County until 2004 when the Arizona Department of Transportation again took control of upgrading the interim road to a freeway.
The Salt River Pima–Maricopa Indian Community (SRPMIC) comprises two distinct Native American tribes—the Pima and the Maricopa —many of whom were originally part of the Halchidhoma (Xalchidom) tribe. The community was permanently created by an Executive Order of US President Rutherford B. Hayes on June 14th, 1879. The community area includes 53,600 acres (217 km2), of which 19,000 remain a natural preserve. As of 2022, the total population is 7,386. The community is a federally recognized tribe located in Arizona.
North/Northwest Phoenix is a region in the city of Phoenix, Arizona. While the area with this name has no official separate status, it usually refers to the Urban Villages of Paradise Valley, North Mountain, Deer Valley, Desert View, and North Gateway.
State Route 30, also known as the Tres Rios Freeway, is a planned freeway in the southwest part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. It is planned as a reliever for Interstate 10 five miles to the south and will run through the communities of Buckeye, Goodyear, Avondale, and Phoenix.
State Route 24, also known as the Gateway Freeway or the Williams Gateway Freeway, is a freeway in the extreme southeastern region of the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. The roadway is planned as a controlled-access highway to move traffic from the southeastern suburbs of Phoenix to planned ones in northwestern Pinal County. It is the lowest-numbered state route in Arizona. The first mile from Loop 202 to Ellsworth Road opened on May 4, 2014. An extension to Ironwood Drive opened in 2022, with the completion of "Interim Phase II"; the first mile of this extension from Ellsworth Road to Williams Field Road opened on April 1, 2022, with the remainder following on August 11. Planning for future sections has been halted until studies for the Pinal North-South Freeway are completed to confirm how the two freeways will intersect.
U.S. Route 60 (US 60) is an east–west United States Highway within Arizona. The highway runs for 369 miles (594 km) from a junction with Interstate 10 near Quartzsite to the New Mexico state line near Springerville. As it crosses the state, US 60 overlaps at various points: I-17, I-10, SR 77, SR 260, US 191, and US 180. Between Wickenburg and Phoenix, the route is known as Grand Avenue. From Tempe to Apache Junction, it is known as the Superstition Freeway.
The metropolitan area of Phoenix in the U.S. state of Arizona contains one of the nation's largest and fastest-growing freeway systems, with over 1,405 lane miles (2,261 km) as of 2005.
Transportation in Phoenix, Arizona is primarily via private cars. Public transport is run under the brand Valley Metro, and consists of buses, light rail, and a streetcar system.
Many arterial roads in the Phoenix metropolitan area have the same name in multiple cities or towns. Some roads change names or route numbers across town borders, resulting in occasional confusion. For example, the road known as Apache Boulevard in Tempe continues east as Main Street in neighboring Mesa and then as Apache Trail in Apache Junction. Although Broadway Road maintains the same name through Goodyear, Avondale, Phoenix, Tempe, Mesa, and Apache Junction, each town uses a different reference point for address numbers.
Northern Parkway is a limited-access road in Maricopa County, Arizona that serves the west part of the Phoenix metropolitan area. Northern Parkway was first opened in December 2013. Northern Parkway currently ends at the Agua Fria River but is planned to extend to the US 60.