Ready to Rubble! Raising Awareness and Support for Arizona’s Largest Urban Freeway Construction Project

When the Arizona Department of Transportation (ADOT) aimed to craft memorable ways to build public support for the largest urban freeway reconstruction project in state history, WSP’s Charles Misra found inspiration for one campaign in an unlikely place: professional wrestling.

The Broadway Curve Improvement Project is reconstructing a section of Interstate 10 (I-10) used by more than 300,000 motorists daily. It covers 11 miles of the highway, between the Loop 202 San Tan South Mountain Freeway and Interstate 17, near the Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport.

The highway is widening from four lanes to six general lanes and two high-occupancy vehicle lanes in each direction, as well as replacing several bridges and adding collector-distributor roads.

When spending more than $800 million, one of the rockiest roads can be developing and maintaining public support, demonstrating that its long-term value is worth the expense and the disruptions that a major urban freeway construction project creates.

WSP is the general engineering consultant that is assisting ADOT with public outreach initiatives communicating the importance of the improvements, as well as safety alerts and construction updates to provide timely information about the project’s progress, detours and other news.

“WSP has done extensive work with social media and with the project website, in tandem with the project developer and our client, ADOT,” said Misra, WSP communications and public involvement consultant. “There has been a lot of community outreach, including hosting community outreach tables, speaking events, newsletters, meetings with local constituents and stakeholders, as well as extensive media outreach and interviews.”

It’s serious business … but that doesn’t mean you can’t have a little fun with it along the way.

When the construction team planned to take down three former bridges over one weekend in April 2023, the work was going to require the complete shutdown of Interstate 10 in both directions through one of the busiest sections of I-10 in the Phoenix area.

A short-term inconvenience for local motorists? Sure. But the project communications team decided to do more than just explain the situation and provide alternative routes for motorists.

Instead, they seized the moment and invited stakeholders, students in local engineering programs and young professionals to visit the worksite, peek behind the barricades and witness the process of bridge removal firsthand.

That concept turned a minor disruption into an unforgettable educational opportunity known as “Ready to Rubble: The Ultimate Bridge Takedown.”

“As we were coming up with something that would draw people into project, this idea popped into my mind,” Misra said. “Growing up I was a wrestling fan, and I just started thinking about the start of those matches, when the microphone would drop and the ring announcer (Michael Buffer) would shout to the crowd, ‘Let’s get ready to rumble!’”

Click on location points above to learn more about the three bridges that were taken down during the Ready to Rubble! public event in Phoenix, Arizona.

Once they changed “rumble” to “rubble,” a cleverly conceived campaign was created. “After that, it took on a life of its own,” he added.

WSP collaborated with ADOT's Public Involvement team, setting four key goals for the Ready to Rubble event:

• educate the public about the bridge removal process;
• engage the public and project stakeholders in the project process;
• establish ADOT as the state’s premiere engineering firm; and
• educate the public about road closures needed for the bridge removal.

The team provided on-site tours for stakeholders and students as the bridge removal unfolded before their eyes. They used media outreach and digital engagement tools, including social media and the ADOT blog, to provide a similar educational experience for the general public.

You could say Ready to Rubble really brought down the house.

Media coverage hit every major Phoenix area news outlet, and information shared on the ADOT blog and social media channels garnered more than 780,000 impressions and hundreds of comments during that weekend.

Misra said he helped lead some tour groups during the bridges removal and they were left with an unforgettable impression. “It was quite a sight to see the bridge while the removal was taking place, and also a rare moment to see the normally traffic-heavy I-10 with no vehicles at all.”

Additionally, Misra said the bridge takedown and related road closures met with minimal negative public response, in large part due to extensive communication prior to the event, leading to a favorable response to the event.

“I think what set this campaign apart was having clear objectives to achieve using a multilayered approach,” he said. “It all come together even better than we could have ever imagined.”

The impact of the Broadway Curve public communications campaigns has not gone unnoticed, piling up several prestigious awards for the team’s effectiveness and creativity.

Earlier this year, the Transportation Research Board (TRB) named Ready to Rubble as the winner of its 17th annual competition in the Communicating Concepts with the Public category. The award recognizes fresh and creative methods for communicating technical transportation issues with the public.

In March, WTS Phoenix presented its 2024 Innovative Transportation Solutions Project of the Year Award to the Ready to Rubble event. This award salutes the creative work for an outstanding and innovative transportation project or service that improves the quality of life for its users and the community.

The project also won several 2024 awards from the Phoenix chapter of the Public Relations Society of America:

• Copper Anvil Award, Most Effective Campaign on a Shoestring Budget ($5,000 or Less), for the Ready to Rubble campaign;
• Copper Anvil Award, Special Events, for the Ready to Rubble campaign;
• Copper Anvil Award, Newsletters; and
• Award of Merit, Video, for I-10 Broadway Curve Improvement Project’s Behind the Scenes video series.
• Award of Merit: Social Media Outreach, for I-10 Broadway Curve Improvement Project’s Behind the Scenes video series

“It means a lot to have earned this much recognition for our efforts to inform the public about this important project, and about the highway construction process overall,” Misra said. “We are very proud of that.”

When it’s completed in early 2025, the reconstructed Broadway Curve will alleviate traffic issues, such as eliminating the dangerous weaving commonplace in the old configuration, and prepare Phoenix for long-term growth.