THE GOLDEN CORRIDOR
P
inal County’s Golden Corridor includes the communities along the primary routes between Phoenix and Tucson, the zone of largest growth and diversification in the county. Its principal cities include Casa Grande, Coolidge, Eloy, Florence, Marana, Maricopa, Queen Creek and San Tan Valley, along with the entirety of the Ak-Chin Indian Community and a large portion of the Gila River Indian Community, including Sacaton, the community’s capital. It generally follows the Santa Cruz River Valley from Tucson in the south to its confluence with the Gila River in the north and has a long history of agricultural activity, dating to the earliest Native American farmers in the region. It has become an area of phenomenal growth because it provides easy access to the benefits and assets of the two largest metropolitan areas in the state without the cost, congestion, limits and challenges posed by living in the big cities. The more relaxed lifestyle, coupled with the easy access, is fueling the area’s growth.
The Golden Corridor’s many attractions make for an interesting lifestyle and active level of engagement for resident and visitor alike. As the new, modern manufacturing projects move ahead, central Pinal County is establishing the Arizona Innovation and Technology Corridor between the two largest universities in the state and, with a community college dedicated to helping to build a local workforce, it’s leading to a kind of “reverse commute” for skilled and technical workers from Phoenix and Tucson. The Golden Corridor is thought by some to be limited to the communities along I-10 between Phoenix and Tucson, like Casa Grande, Eloy and Marana. But it also includes the Phoenix suburban areas of San Tan Valley, the largest unincorporated community in the county, and Queen Creek, as well as the communities easily accessed from I-10, like Coolidge, and Sacaton along Highway 87 east of I-10, and Maricopa and Ak-Chin along Highway 347 west of I-10, as well as the County Seat, Florence, east of Coolidge at the junction of Highway 87 and Highway 79.
PHOTO BLUSHING CACTUS PHOTOGRAPHY
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PHOTO BLUSHING CACTUS PHOTOGRAPHY
The area is accessed, of course, by I-10, which many think of as “the highway between Phoenix and Tucson,” but it is so much more. I-10 is America’s southernmost, and, “Warm Weather,” cross-country highway, stretching just under 2,500 miles from Santa Monica, California, to Jacksonville, Florida, providing direct easy access to and from Pinal County for such cities as San Antonio and Houston, Texas, Baton Rouge and New Orleans, Louisiana, and, of course, Los Angeles, California. When you add the accessibility to San Diego, California, by way of Yuma, Arizona, provided by I-8, and the access to and from Mexico provided by I-19 via Nogales, it becomes clear why the crossroads location of Pinal County has become such a desirable location for exploration and for long-term business development. That, in turn, has led to the planned development of I-11, which will ultimately provide access all the way from Mexico to Canada through Pinal County. In addition, with the extensive railroad network serving the county, it’s easy to see why such largescale projects as Lucid Motors, the new, innovative high-tech electric car company, chose Casa Grande for its manufacturing operation. Similarly, Nikola Motors (named for famed inventor Nikola Tesla) has chosen Coolidge to build a plant to manufacture their hybrid trucks with power units inspired by electric
