While official groundbreaking ceremony was taking place Tuesday for the new Aerospace Parkway on Tucson’s South Side, Raytheon Tucson announced $763.5 million in new bookings for the Tucson missile systems facility.

Dr. Taylor Lawrence, Raytheon Missile Systems’ President said, “We make missiles and we never want anything to go wrong, but if something does go wrong we need a buffer zone.”

Pima County officials say the 4.5-mile, $12.7 million road project will be part of a large, multi-stage economic development plan that could help turn Tucson into a hub for regional transportation and for the aerospace industry.

The new road will replace Hughes Access Road, which sits one-half mile to the north. That has been too close for comfort for Raytheon Missile Systems.

Lawrence noted that when billionaire Howard Hughes first bought the airport-area property 60 years ago, it was “out away from the city with wide-open spaces so we could build missiles with a nice buffer zone around it. But that open space is rapidly eroding. The development around our airport site is a concern, because we need to have minimum distances to maintain a safe operating environment.”

State leaders including Governor Doug Ducey, Senator John McCain and Representative Martha McSally said that the project will help not just Arizona, but the country. “It’s not only a great day for southern Arizona but a great day for America,” Sen. McCain said. “Because with this work that we’ve accomplished today — we will better be able to defend America.”

Other aspects of the transportation corridor package, called the Sonoran Corridor, include a proposed second runway at Tucson International Airport and an extension of the rail line that connects Tucson and Nogales to intersect with Union Pacific’s main east/west route. Planners say the new road will give the Tucson International Airport the space for a new runway, the Arizona Air National Guard’s 162nd Wing will get more space, and Raytheon Missile Systems will be able to expand. Phase two will be to connect I-10 with I-19, the Port of Tucson and U of A Science and Technology Park.

“This is really the first step, the road,” said Pima County Administrator Chuck Huckleberry. “The next steps are the second runway and additional rail access, and really creating a logistics center in the vicinity of the Tucson International Airport that is the logistics center for the southwestern United States.”

Huckleberry said the new road may help entice other aerospace companies to join Raytheon and set up shop along Aerospace Parkway.

Money for the project is coming from the Pima County Regional Transportation Authority.

Governor Doug Ducey was in Tucson Wednesday speaking at the Tucson Chamber and then TREO, followed by a visit to the MIRROR Lab at University of Arizona and later speaking at a meeting put on by Tucson Realty & Trust and BleachFleischman for invited real estate and business people.

Gov Ducey’s message was the same at all these meetings, pride for our state and balancing the budget, as well as a plea for Arizonans to work together and help to grow Arizona in a positive way. “Tough times demand tough decisions,” so that’s what he says was done in the budget.

“Over the past several months I’ve spent a fair amount of time with governors from both parties. The advice from all of them has been consistent: “No matter what, get your state’s budget balanced in the first session. Once that’s accomplished then you can tackle everything else,” Ducey said.

“Working with the Arizona Legislature we did that, passing a budget that puts us on the path to structural balance for the first time since 2007 and closing a $1 billion hole.”

“It wasn’t easy, Ducey added. “We made real reductions to government spending and accomplished permanent decisions that reform government – rather than just biting around the edges.”

“Not only will we have a leaner government; we’ll have a better one, more accountable to the taxpayers. And we did all this WITHOUT raising taxes.”

“Naturally, the spending lobby and special interests don’t like it. They just assume government gets bigger and spends more. I happen to believe government shouldn’t spend money that doesn’t exist,” just as he promised during the campaign.

Ducey went on to say, “One thing I’m particularly proud of is that we did all this while protecting education.  Here are three facts I’d like you to know about state support for education spending:

1.  This budget is the most Arizona has EVER spent on education in our state’s history
2.  49% of the state’s $9.1 billion budget will go to education (K-12 and universities combined)
3.  This budget includes more than $600 million in general fund dollars for universities, representing 7% of the state’s budget”

“Our budget is values-based. We set priorities and trimmed back where it matters, protecting the areas that I know we all care the about most,” referring to protecting child protective services, protecting the University of Arizona and pushing money into the classrooms.

Ducey says with the budget now balanced, he can focus on the economy, bring more jobs, not only to Maricopa County where he did happen to sign the huge $2 billion Apple contract less than a month after taking office. He now says he will focus on bringing more California businesses to Arizona, make saving Davis Monthan a state issue and focus on expanding trade and transportation with Mexico.

Not a bad start for a guy who just took office nine weeks ago, on Jan 5, 2015.

For prior Real Estate Daily News stories on the $2 Billion Apple facility coming to Mesa click here and click here.

A report by Brookings Mountain West and the University of Nevada-Las Vegas portrayed a bright economic picture for both the Tucson – Phoenix metro areas.

The Mountain Monitor Brookings-MountainMonitor-2014-Q3 looked at the Mountain West region, which, as a group, outperformed the national economy during the third quarter of 2014 on all four indicators of economic: employment growth, output growth, unemployment, and house prices.

All but two major metro areas in the region added jobs, and six did so at a faster rate than the country as a whole. As a result, employment across the 10 metro areas increased by 0.7%, compared to 0.5% nationwide. This marked a sharp and welcome acceleration in the rate of job creation for the region.

By the end of the third quarter, the region as a whole was no longer significantly outpacing the national housing recovery, but half of the region’s major metros saw prices increase faster than the country as a whole. Las Vegas, for its part, saw the largest quarterly increase in house prices in the country, followed in the region by Denver and Tucson.

Overall, trends among the region‘s major metropolitan areas seem to portend a rebalancing of momentum from the metro areas on Utah’s Wasatch Front toward Colorado’s Front Range, with Boise performing consistently, Las Vegas catching up quickly, and Phoenix and Tucson providing increasingly steady and sometimes powerful boosts. Albuquerque, for its part, still lags the national economic recovery.

Phoenix posted the fastest job growth in the region during the third quarter, as employment increased by 1.1 percent, more than twice the national average of 0.5 percent. Home prices in the Valley increased by 1.1%.

Tucson didn’t have the job growth of Phoenix, but did post a job gain of 0.5%. Where Tucson really shined is on the housing front. Tucson saw prices increase by 2.1%, well above the national rate of 1.3% and behind only Denver and Las Vegas in the 10-city study.