Route Description
Interstate 17 is known as the Black Canyon Freeway from the northern end of the Phoenix Metropolitan Area to its first interchange with Interstate 10 northwest of Downtown Phoenix, which is known as The Stack. At the curve (The Durango Curve) southwest of downtown, between the 19th Avenue and Buckeye Road interchanges, it picks up the designation Maricopa Freeway all the way to the southern terminus at the second Interstate 10 junction. It is one of the metropolitan area's primary freeways.
I-17 has the unusual distinction of starting at approximately milepost 194 instead of at milepost zero. This is a holdover from Arizona's old system of marking mileposts, where a branching route would continue the milepost numbering of its original host instead of starting over at zero. Interstate 17 inherited its milepost locations from SR 69, which the freeway replaced between Phoenix and Cordes Junction. SR 69's mileposting was such that it coincided with US 89's mileposting, which was 201.6 where the two routes intersected. When I-17 was constructed, the existing mileposting for SR 69 was retained.
-
"The Stack", intersection of Interstate 10 and I-17. Looking north up I-17, downtown Phoenix.
-
Southern terminus at I-10 in Phoenix
-
View of the Red Rocks of Sedona from I-17, just south of Munds Park
-
Interstate 17 near Flagstaff
Read more about this topic: Interstate 17
Famous quotes containing the words route and/or description:
“In the mountains the shortest route is from peak to peak, but for that you must have long legs. Aphorisms should be peaks: and those to whom they are spoken should be big and tall of stature.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (18441900)
“The Sage of Toronto ... spent several decades marveling at the numerous freedoms created by a global village instantly and effortlessly accessible to all. Villages, unlike towns, have always been ruled by conformism, isolation, petty surveillance, boredom and repetitive malicious gossip about the same families. Which is a precise enough description of the global spectacles present vulgarity.”
—Guy Debord (b. 1931)