Let's add a digit to 88, says Arizona

Hi All,

For many years, Arizona State Route 88 happily strummed along between Apache
Junction and the outskirts of Globe. Along the way, the route briefly
degraded to dirt-road status. This downgrade certainly did not stop
adventurous motorists, since the nearby Theodore Roosevelt Dam offered a bit
of scenery and non-urban charm. So imagine my surprise when I visited what
was to be the eastern terminus of Route 88. It was actually the southern
terminus of Route 188!

What happened? Sometime after 2003, the state decided to have Route 188
annex the eastern half of Route 88. The reassignment seems logical anyways,
because the aforementioned stretch seemed more longitudinal than
latitudinal. Route 188 was previously assigned as a longitudinal route
between the Theodore Roosevelt Dam and its northern terminus.

Why not find out where the northern terminus is, plot some geographic
coordinates, and perhaps catch some desert scenery at the Arizona State
Route 188 profile?

http://worldwide-hwys.calrog.com/az-188.html

This photograph is brought to you by the Worldwide Highway Library, the best
collection of highway-sign and -scenery photographs on the web. With seven
years of experience under the belt, the Library has been expanding its
waistline faster than Rush Limbaugh and Michael Moore ever did w/ theirs!
Tsk tsk.

Cheers,

Carl Rogers
"Adding human experience to highway enthusiasm"
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In article >,
"Carl Rogers" > wrote:

> Why not find out where the northern terminus is, plot some geographic
> coordinates, and perhaps catch some desert scenery at the Arizona
> State Route 188 profile?
>
> http://worldwide-hwys.calrog.com/az-188.html

I agree that this is a beautiful road and makes more sense with its
current route. My wife and I have bicycled the entire current AZ 188
while biking from Flagstaff through Happy Jack and Payson to Globe.

Paul

--
Paul Anderson
OpenVMS Engineering
Hewlett-Packard Company

Some history:

AZ-188 (north section from AZ-87 to Roosevelt Dam), was all-dirt until
the early 1970s when they bypassed Pumpkin Center with about a half
mile of new road. The dirt section began again just past that.

The rest of it was not paved until the 1980s, then the dam was
bypassed but that was not done until 1990. As you hit the north end
of the bridge on the lake side was a place known as 'Motel Point'.
There was a structure there in the 1920s and touring groups would
present things there, it was a motel, hence the name. I saw the
foundation in the 60s and 70s there. I do not know how the end came
for the building.

Also in 1990 the section from Roosevelt Dam itself to the town of
Roosevelt was bypassed and the lower road can be seen on the lake side
of the hill as you go by and part of that is used to access the
workers housing. The workers housing exists from at least the 30s,
and many houses go back to the 40s at least. The 'great cottonwood'
you see about midway at the lowest three houses was planted in 1947,
and has been a major landmark even to those who didn't care about the
houses, I knew someone in South Dakota who knew of it.

The town of Roosevelt is where the 1990 bypass ends. It passes almost
over the old 'Frazier's Store' property which included the post office
for many years, that store was on the south side of the old road. The
store burned in the 1970s.

In 1972, an infamous curve known to many as 'Cadillac Curve' kist east
of the turnoff for Tonto National Monument, plus some other bad curves
was realigned and straightened from about a mile east of the Tonto
National Monument turnoff to the Pinto Creek Bridge, they bypassed the
old buckboard bridge there as well. That was the old area known by
two names, Pinto Creek and Sportsmans Haven. That interestingly is
the 'new' Roosevelt. The post office moved there in the 1980s.

You can find an even earlier alignment east and north of the current
alignment by the National Monument by getting off at the 'Grapevine
Airport' turnoff, about a half mile south of the Monument turnoff.
There's more of this sort of thing where they realigned the road in
1972, plus that earlier road. Also, I understand there is a massive
saguaro, some say it finally fell a few years ago, near the Grapevine
Airport as well. The 'Airport' was actually just a wide place that
general aviation planes could use, we never saw anyone actually use
it.

Also around 1972, the section from the last big bridge to US-60 on the
south end of AZ-88 on the hill between Globe and Miami, now apparently
188, was also realigned, another old bridge was bypassed and torn down
as well. There used to be a 'Y' turn-in that was straightened out
around 1967 where the present junction is, that Y favored southbound
to westbound transitions, it was messy getting from westbound to
northbound, that explains why they did that back then.

The road does continue south past that junction, but it was a local
road going to Claypool, and for some reason ADOT left that one out of
the 'connections' that Arizona's highways are designed to make.