Loop 202

Vulcan Supplies Arizona’s Largest Freeway Project

When the State of Arizona needed aggregates and asphalt to construct its largest freeway project in state history, Vulcan answered the call.

The new Loop 202 South Mountain Freeway in Phoenix, which opened in 2019, is a 22-miles expressway that shortens commuter times by connecting the East and West Valleys and brings significant economic opportunities to the area.

“We’ve been able to demonstrate on a project of this size that not only do we have the resources to support the demand that a project this size generates but also the quality,” said Vulcan Project Manager Jerry Jerman, who has been with the company for more than 25 years.

Vulcan partnered with several state agencies and organizations to help get the job done, including the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) and Connect 202, which helped with design and construction and will continue to  work with Vulcan to maintain the expressway for the next 30 years.

“The importance of a partnership was tremendous on this complex project,” said Walter Lewis III, Project Director at Connect 202 Partners. “Vulcan has been a great partner on the project here for us.”

The public-private partnership also required working with ADOT, the Army Corp of Engineers, the River Indian community, each of whom shared Vulcan’s commitment to ensure safety and quality products were top priorities.

“We’ve recently achieved over five million hours without a lost time incident,” Lewis explained. “To achieve that it takes a lot of teamwork. We’ve put over 5,000 people through safety orientations.”

“It is important to have quality materials because I think there’s so much that goes into the construction of a roadway that the traveling public doesn’t realize the safety issues associated with bad or not quality materials,” said Aaron Ekstrom, Lab Manager at the engineering firm of Raba Kistner. “It costs the public so much to come back in, repave, rework, redo something if the lifecycle is reduced because of the poor quality.”