Highway 95 improvements set to begin
After decades of danger, Highway 95’s road to safe status is about to begin.
Starting this month, a stretch of Highway 95 from Avenue 9E to just north of Rifle Range Road is being expanded to five lanes, a project that will take roughly one year to complete.
Concurrently, long-awaited left and right turn lanes will be added to Highway 95’s intersection with Dome Valley Road.
In early August, YPG Commander Col. Patrick McFall participated in a groundbreaking ceremony that kicked off this phase of lane expansion. Also at the event was YPG Command Sgt. Maj. Herbert Gill, former YPG Commander Ross Poppenberger, and numerous elected officials from local city, county, and state government. Among these were
Yuma County Supervisor Darren Simmons and State Representatives Tim Dunn and Joanne Osborne, all of whom represent districts that YPG is in. Also present were Yuma
Mayor Douglas Nicholls and Deputy Mayor Gary Knight; San Luis
Vice Mayor Matias Rosales; Yuma
County Supervisors Jonathan Lines, Lynne Pancrazi, and Martin Porchas; and State Representatives Charlene Fernandez and Joel John.
“Any time a safety project comes to any U.S. military post, I support it,” said McFall in remarks at the ceremony. “I want to thank each and every one of you for ensuring our YPG Family gets to work safely every day, and gets to go home to their families every day, safely.”
Next summer, construction to widen the Wellton-Mohawk Bridge to five lanes will begin. An additional $10 million that was allocated by the State of Arizona this year will allow for a portion of the road between Rifle Range Road and the bridge to be expanded to five lanes.
Completing Highway 95’s expansion to five lanes all the way to the Aberdeen Road entrance of YPG’s Kofa Firing Range will cost approximately $70 million more than has been allocated to date.
State leaders hope to ensure it is completed as YPG’s prominence at the forefront of Army modernization efforts continues to increase.
The morning and evening commutes to and from the proving ground have long been dubbed the ‘YPG 500,’ an amusing sobriquet if not for the grim list of lives the road has claimed over the past decades. In command surveys of YPG personnel, having to drive daily on Highway 95 is often cited as the worst aspect of being employed at the proving ground. The road is shared not only with farm vehicles working the adjacent fields, but also with winter visitors whose presence normally doubles Yuma’s population for half of the year.