Arizona, constituent state of the United States of America. Arizona is the sixth largest state in the country in terms of area. Its population has always been predominantly urban, particularly since the mid-20th century, when urban and suburban areas began growing rapidly at the expense of the countryside. Some scholars believe that the state’s name comes from a Basque phrase meaning “place of oaks,” while others attribute it to a Tohono O’odham (Papago) Indian phrase meaning “place of the young (or little) spring.” Arizona achieved statehood on February 14, 1912, the last of the 48 conterminous United States to be admitted to the union.

Arizona is a land of contradictions. Although widely reputed for its hot low-elevation desert covered with cacti and creosote bushes, more than half of the state lies at an elevation of at least 4,000 feet (1,200 metres) above sea level, and it possesses the largest stand of evergreen ponderosa pine trees in the world.

Arizona is well known for its waterless tracts of desert, but, thanks to many large man-made lakes, it has many more miles of shoreline than its reputation might suggest. Such spectacular landforms as the Grand Canyon and the Painted Desert have become international symbols of the region’s ruggedness, yet Arizona’s environment is so delicate that in many ways it is more threatened by pollution than are New York City and Los Angeles. Its romantic reputation as a wild desert and a place of old-fashioned close-to-the-earth simplicity is at variance with the fact that after the 1860s the state’s economy became industrial and technological long before it was pastoral or agrarian.

Arizona is located in the southwestern quadrant of the conterminous states, bordered by California to the west, Nevada to the northwest, Utah to the north, New Mexico to the east, and the Mexican state of Sonora to the south. The Colorado River forms the boundary with California and Nevada. Phoenix, situated in the south-central part of the state, is the capital and largest city. Area 113,990 square miles (295,233 square km). Population (2020) 7,151,502.

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Transport in Arizona

Transportation

Like other western states, Arizona has not emphasized the development of mass transit systems, and state and municipal governments struggle to build sufficient roads to accommodate a swelling population. It has long been so. The state’s earliest service industry was long-distance cartage over rough desert and mountain country; in modern times, the five interstate highways that pass through Arizona are crowded with heavy trucks. These highways generally follow historic roads, most of which were established along Native American trade routes and accommodated stagecoaches and freight carriers.

The railroads followed in the later 19th century, with well-established east-west routes passing through southern and northern Arizona, but there was little service to the rugged interior. A greater focus on mass transit development was evident in the state’s larger cities in the early 21st century. A light-rail system that served Phoenix and the surrounding areas began operating in 2008, and Tucson launched a streetcar service in 2014.

Surface transportation is generally organized on the model of southern California, with streets on a grid pattern punctuated by freeways and highways. Within the cities some attention has been given to the development of bicycle paths. Phoenix’s Sky Harbor International Airport offers nonstop international and domestic flights; Tucson International Airport provides more-limited nonstop flights; and Flagstaff and Yuma airports have fewer still. Many other towns have airports capable of accommodating small jet aircraft, and there are numerous military airfields as well.

Roads

The Interstate Highways in Arizona are the segments of the Dwight D. Eisenhower System of Interstate and Defense Highways that are owned and maintained by the U.S. state of Arizona, totaling about 1,169 miles (1,881 km). Arizona has a total of six Interstate Highways, all of which are mainline highways; there are no auxiliary highways. The longest Interstate in Arizona is Interstate 10 (I-10), which traverses east-west through the southern and central parts of the state, serving Phoenix. There are also a total of fourteen active business routes and eight former routes, which were either business loops or spurs for all main highways except. All of Arizona’s existing Interstate Highways have overtaken or replaced some U.S. Routes, which either involved decommissioning or running concurrent with the existing route.

The Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) is the agency responsible for building and maintaining the Interstate Highways in the Arizona State Highway System. These highways are built to Interstate Highway standards, which are freeways that have a 75-mile-per-hour (121 km/h) speed limit in rural areas and a 65 mph (105 km/h) speed limit in urban areas. The numbering scheme used to designate the Interstates was developed by the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO), an organization composed of various state departments of transportation in the United States.

Rail