[Kristie]

deer valley is in north phoenix.. it's not a bad area to be in considering the location of freeways, stores and so forth...

forget anthem and get a new realtor... he's trying to sell you a nice house out in the sticks where it'll take you at least an hour to get there since it's WAY out there and traffic is nothing but jam city! if he tries to tell you that they're going to widen I-17 from 101 to Anthem, you tell him that that project won't be completed for another 7-10 years and won't even get started for another 2-3 years.. construction will make I-17 up to that area a worse nightmare than it is now...if he tries to sell you pinal county, queen creek, maricopa (town of) or in that area, again.. get yourself a new realtor because he's only looking out for himself. if they say that highways are going to widen and commute time is going to get better, tell him he's full of garbage and doesn't know what he's talking bout because pinal county will never have enough money to get things up to par considering the amount of folks moving into that county as quickly as they are.

if you need transportation information, i can give you that cuz that's what my job is all about.

Surprise is a traffic nightmare too but if your going to be instructing at glendale, it'll work ok for that...altho there will be loud fighter jets overhead all the time since surprise is on approach to Luke AFB (lots of folks complain about that).

If your going to instruct at deer valley, you'll want to live in the north valley, peoria, scottsdale, cave creek/tatum area or even (north) central phoenix (I-17/bell road and north). the closer you live to the airport, the easier it will be as far as traffic is concerned. it can take about 2.5 hrs now to go from apache junction/mesa to goodyear/avondale.

goodyear, avondale and litchfield park are nice areas on the west side and booming quite nicely but I-10 out there isn't going for widening for at least another 10 years.. they might try to expedite it but ADOT only gets oh so much funds each year and they have to be very selective as to what needs are more priority. It looks like the 303 will soon come to the design table in the north valley (RFP's are coming out soon) but that also means it won't be built for at least another 15-20 years if we're lucky.

scottsdale & paradise valley are a few of the *nicer* areas..also a bit pricey too but you get what you pay for! Gilbert/Chandler is nice on the south end if your going to go to williams gateway airport... tempe is great for being centralized in the area...the avenue streets in central phoenix is the area to stay away... i would say from Central Avenue to 80th Avenue going west and baseline to bell road going north are the areas to probably stay out of if you don't want trouble (maryville, tolleson, el mirage, south central)....it's mostly in central phoenix but it's typically in "the avenue's" as east of central ave are "streets".

SSL and HTH