Interstate 11 seeks to connect Nogales to Wickenburg, Arizona and has various routes up in the air. Despite doubts from the public that a new interstate does not outperform the option of expanding preexisting roadways construction plans for I-11 through the Sonoran Desert West of Tucson prevail. My worry surrounds this proposed Western route that would bisect the Avra and Attar valleys. Not only does this route run close to the Saguaro National Park, Ironwood Forest National Monument and Tucson Mountain Park it crosses the Tucson Mitigation Corridor. This corridor itself is land set aside to mitigate the impacts of the 1990 construction on the Central Arizona Project (CAP) which delivers water from the Colorado River through 336 miles of Arizona. The canals have disturbed wildlife migration and the Tucson Mitigation Corridor was protected to compensate for losses. Destruction of the Bureau of Land Management’s mitigation corridor would put at risk the wildlife it was established to project.
Lynette Butron
Downtown
Disclaimer: As submitted to the Arizona Daily Star.
