PHOENIX — For the past two decades, the Arizona Department of Transportation has made the US 93 corridor a priority, by methodically turning what was once a two-lane rural roadway into a modern four-lane divided highway along the primary travel route for Phoenix motorists headed to Las Vegas and a vital corridor for trade and commerce.

This past weekend, ADOT completed another widened section of US 93, approximately 20 miles north of Wikieup and moved one step closer to the agency’s ultimate goal of transforming the entire 200-mile stretch from Wickenburg to the Hoover Dam bypass bridge into a modern, four-lane divided highway.

The completed $20 million project widened the three-mile-long Antelope Wash segment of US 93 (mileposts 101-104), which included building two new southbound lanes and reconstructing the two northbound lanes to tie into the new roadway configuration.

This was one of two US 93 widening projects ADOT has been working on this year. In February, ADOT launched another expansion project along US 93 between state routes 71 and 89 (mileposts 185-190), just north of Wickenburg. The $12.5 million project will include converting the roadway from two lanes to four lanes and is expected to be completed in 2016.

Since 1998, ADOT has invested more than $350 million in projects to upgrade the US 93 corridor, which stretches from Kingman to the Nevada state line and Wickenburg to Interstate 40 (a 23-mile segment of I-40 east of Kingman connects the north and south sections of US 93).

Currently, all but 46 miles of the 200-mile drive (more than 75 percent) from Wickenburg to the Nevada state line has been upgraded to a four-lane divided highway in an effort to improve traffic flow, support the movement of freight and enhance safety through this heavily traveled area. The entire northern segment of US 93 from Kingman to the Nevada state line (mileposts 1-68) is now a four-lane divided highway following the completion of a $71 million project in 2010.