{"id":75020,"date":"2025-07-19T09:28:11","date_gmt":"2025-07-19T09:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/75020\/"},"modified":"2025-07-19T09:28:11","modified_gmt":"2025-07-19T09:28:11","slug":"phoenix-pushes-forward-with-cool-pavement-despite-mixed-results","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/75020\/","title":{"rendered":"Phoenix pushes forward with cool pavement despite mixed results"},"content":{"rendered":"

PHOENIX (AZFamily)<\/b> \u2014 With triple-digit temperatures upon us, Phoenix is trying to be proactive, installing a specific chemical coating on the roads that\u2019s designed to reflect heat<\/a>. But as Arizona\u2019s Family Investigates found, cool pavement is more expensive and has had mixed results. <\/p>\n

Despite that, the city is moving forward with the program. To date, they have installed more than 140 miles. <\/p>\n

Crews spent Friday morning prepping a stretch of road off 19th Avenue, south of Camelback Road, to put down cool pavement.<\/p>\n

The city paused the program last year<\/a>, citing issues with the product it was using. They\u2019ve since partnered with another company and are using two different coatings.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow we\u2019re catching up and getting back on track,\u201d Ryan Stevens, an engineering manager with the city of Phoenix<\/a>, said. He continued to tout the benefits.<\/p>\n

Arizona\u2019s Family Investigates started looking into this back in 2023. On a hot July day, using a heat gun, the asphalt was 153 degrees. The cool pavement came in at 144 degrees.<\/p>\n

But ASU\u2019s research found that 6 feet off the ground, the air temperature was only 0.3 of a degree cooler<\/a> during the day and only half a degree cooler at night. That study also found that the light reflected off the road makes it hotter for pedestrians.<\/p>\n

Then there\u2019s the price. The city said it\u2019s three times as expensive as the traditional coating. Arizona\u2019s Family Investigates also found questions about how it\u2019s wearing.<\/p>\n

In 2024, the team stopped by five different locations that had been treated with it over the last four years. \u201cWe\u2019re always monitoring performance,\u201d Stevens said.<\/p>\n

He explained it should last eight years. There\u2019s also another benefit; the city says the cooler surface temperature<\/a> better protects what\u2019s under the road. \u201cA lot of people are excited that the city is doing something to address urban heat,\u201d Stevens said.<\/p>\n

Neighbors the team spoke with weren\u2019t exactly excited. \u201cIt\u2019s an incremental change. I don\u2019t really have any problem with it,\u201d Brian Curry said. His road has had cool pavement for several years.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know that I really noticed a difference. It does make the street look nicer,\u201d his neighbor, Sophia Sanchez, said.<\/p>\n

The city said it would continue to install cool pavement through the end of September, but it couldn\u2019t provide specifics on how many miles that would be. <\/p>\n

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Copyright 2025 KTVK\/KPHO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX (AZFamily) \u2014 With triple-digit temperatures upon us, Phoenix is trying to be proactive, installing a specific chemical…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":75021,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,5643,52241,1587,52238,52244,52243,9366,1589,52242,52240,17541,52239,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-75020","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-arizona","10":"tag-asu-study","11":"tag-az","12":"tag-cool-pavement","13":"tag-different-coating","14":"tag-mixed-results","15":"tag-pedestrians","16":"tag-phoenix","17":"tag-reflect-heat","18":"tag-summer-weather","19":"tag-temperatures","20":"tag-triple-digit-heat","21":"tag-united-states","22":"tag-united-states-of-america","23":"tag-unitedstates","24":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","25":"tag-us","26":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114879195261430121","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}