The following is the opinion and analysis of the writer:
Curtis Lueck
It takes time to build new roads, but Sunset Links Road has instead aged like a fine wine.
The story began during the great flood of 1983, when the old one-lane Bailey bridge across the Santa Cruz River washed away. For decades afterward, the Sunset Road bridge became something of a local legend: a connection that existed on maps, in transportation plans, and in the memories of longtime Tucson Mountains Foothills residents like me.
Replacement proposals surfaced in county bond programs' "wish lists" more than once. Yet the bridge remained missing in action. The breakthrough finally came with the voter-approved Regional Transportation Authority plan of 2006. In February 2017, the first phase opened: a handsome new bridge over the Santa Cruz River and a reconstructed Sunset Road connection from Silverbell Road to Interstate 10. After waiting 34 years for a replacement bridge, area residents could be forgiven for thinking the waiting was over.
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Not quite. The new bridge and interchange were closed off again in only six years. In early 2023, ADOT began widening Interstate 10 between Ina and Ruthrauff roads and constructing the final Sunset Links extension from I-10 to River Road for the RTA and Pima County. The impressive new multimodal corridor includes bridges over the Union Pacific Railroad tracks and the Rillito River, improved access to The Chuck Huckelberry Loop and a new route between River Road, I-10 and Silverbell Road.
Elected officials were understandably excited when they assumed the project was complete. They held a ribbon-cutting ceremony on May 6. There was only one minor inconvenience: motorists still could not use the road. The traffic signals were not quite ready, and some finishing touches were still needed. The barriers remained in place because the road couldn’t be safely opened to traffic.
Now, a month after that pre-need ribbon cutting, Sunset Links is opening for real. The finished project is attractive, functional and worth celebrating. It will relieve pressure on Orange Grove Road, improve access to Interstate 10 and provide a much-needed regional interconnection for residents west of the freeway. Congratulations to ADOT, Pima County, and the RTA for finally pulling it off.
Looking forward, Pima County can now take advantage of the new corridor. The logical next step is a short roadway extension — roughly 600 feet — to Camino de la Tierra across County-owned land. That modest connection would greatly improve regional circulation, provide another route around the flood-prone Rillito River wet crossing and make the new investment work even harder for the public. Inexplicably, that short section wasn’t in the scope of the original project.
The county should also move forward with long-delayed economic-development planning for the nearby Sunset Innovation Campus and the broader Tres Rios area. Sunset Links was built partly to improve access and unlock opportunity. Now is the time to use the added roadway capacity and recover some of the very significant public investment in Sunset Links.
After 43 years, the Tucson Mountains Foothills area finally has its road connection back. Let us hope the proposed 600-foot extension won’t need to wait decades for its ribbon-cutting ceremony.
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Curtis Lueck is a retired transportation engineer and planner with almost 50-years experience in Pima County. He was also a member of several RTA and PAG committees throughout my career, most recently as a member of the RTA's Technical Management Committee.
