Oak Creek Canyon will be more difficult to navigate over the next year and a half, and locals are not too happy about it.
At their virtual meeting on March 23, Arizona Department of Transportation engineers and project managers discussed the upcoming projects that will partially close a portion of the State Route 89A through Oak Creek Canyon.
“The main concerns of the meeting’s attendees were related to the upcoming traffic restrictions,” Arizona Department of Transportation Public Information Officer Ryan Harding said. “Since SR 89A is so narrow it is not possible to safely construct the improvements without single-lane restrictions and limited full closures. ADOT realizes any restrictions to this corridor are going to be inconvenient; however, we have done our best to limit the overall impacts.”
According to the assistant district engineer for ADOT’s Northcentral District Brenden Foley, all three improvements are necessary for the road’s integrity and operations. These improvements include drainage and sediment control, rockfall mitigation and Pumphouse Bridge rehabilitation.
But many residents feel the schedule and disruption to traffic have shown tourism is the true priority with residents being put on the back burner.
And it’s just not just local residents who are concerned. Many local businesses are seeing the effects of this long-term construction plan as well.
According to the Soundbites Grill management, multiple employees commute from Flagstaff to their Uptown location. And in addition to creating a more complicated commute for them, multiple applicants have withdrawn their resumes and consideration once they heard about the construction.
“My opinion is the construction is going to be a hardship for employers who already have a difficult time finding enough employees locally to fulfill all the vacant positions,” the manager said.
And they are not the only restaurant and business that employs staff from Flagstaff either. Countless restaurants and shops in Uptown like Oak Creek Brewery and West Sedona staff their business from Flagstaff – based employees, as rent prices up north seem a lot more affordable for service industry workers.
According to ADOT and Sedona city staff, the project work schedules we r e discussed to have the least amount of disruption to traffic possible. This schedule includes limited daytime closures and night closures.
There will be 250 construction days, with five daytime full closures and 10 overnight full closures total. None of these closures or traffic restrictions will be allowed during weekends or state holidays.
According to ADOT staff, the public will be notified seven days before full closures. But access to residential and business properties in the canyon during the closures will be detoured. ADOT also has an online sign-up for texts and email with all road construction updates for traffic and closures on their website.
“The public information meeting was held as part of ADOT’s ongoing efforts to keep residents and businesses in Oak Creek Canyon, Flagstaff and Sedona as well as regular users of State Route 89A informed of these improvements that have been planned for several years,” Harding said.
Construction is expected to begin in the next few weeks with an anticipated by Fall 2023 completion, and a possible break in the winter.
