Phase I Data Recovery at the Villages of Tortolita, Town of Maraña, Pima County, Arizona

Summary

In April 2007, SWCA Environmental Consultants (SWCA) completed archaeological testing of seven sites on 1,896 acres of privately owned land for the proposed Villages of Tortolita development. The proposed development area is located north of the Town of Marana in Pima and Pinal counties. This testing was conducted that followed a treatment plan developed at the request of Mr. Shane Graser of TMR Investors, LLC.

The total proposed Villages of Tortolita development area has been previously surveyed for cultural resources in four segments. In 2002, archaeologists from Old Pueblo Archaeology Center surveyed the 364-acre Shreven-Barnett-Levy property (Jones and Dart 2002). In April 2004, archaeologists from SWCA evaluated the Reilly-Holsclaw property, which consists of six parcels totaling 729 acres (Barr 2004). The 695-acre Wiskes property, also in Pima County, was evaluated in May 2005 (Barr 2005). Finally, additional parcels totaling 108 acres were surveyed in October 2006 to complete the cultural resource evaluation of the project area (Tucker 2006). The results of these four surveys are summarized in Tucker (2006).

Fourteen archaeological sites are located within the development area, as well as 71 isolated occurrences. Of the 14 sites within the development area, six have been determined or recommended eligible to the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP), and one site will require additional work before its eligibility can be determined. For the seven sites that are recommended ineligible, their information potential is considered exhausted through recording, and no further archaeological work is needed.

One site, AZ AA:12:875 (ASM), the historic El Paso Natural Gas Line 1007, has been determined by the State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) to be eligible to the NRHP, but the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation issued an exemption regarding the Section 106 evaluation process for historic in-use natural gas pipelines (Federal Register Vol. 67, No. 66, pp. 16364-16365, dated April 5, 2002). As a result, this document does not consider archaeological treatment of this site. Obviously, however, any development work in the vicinity of the pipeline will have to be coordinated with El Paso Natural Gas.

Another site, AZ AA:12:251 (ASM), the Marana Platform Mound site, is one of the major prehistoric sites of the Northern Tucson Basin region and was found to extend into the proposed development area. A 61-acre parcel that encompasses this site, including a moderate buffer area around the perimeter, has been designated by the developers for donation to Pima County for preservation of the site. Consequently, AZ AA:12:251 (ASM) will not be impacted by the development of the property, and no further treatment is considered in this document.

The treatment plan called for archaeological testing through subsurface mechanical trenching at five sites: AZ AA:7:500 (ASM), AZ AA:12:631 (ASM), AZ AA:12:682 (ASM), AZ AA:12:683 (ASM), and AZ AA:12:962 (ASM). These sites are all prehistoric Hohokam occupations that are considered eligible or possibly eligible to the NRHP, under Criterion D, for their potential to yield important scientific information. The eligibility of two historical-period sites, AZ AA:11:139 (ASM) and AZ AA:12:963 (ASM), was not determined during survey; they were documented more thoroughly as part of the archaeological testing program.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SWCA DAHA Resources   •
• Digital Archive of Huhugam Archaeology (DAHA)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): SWCA Environmental Consultants

Sponsor(s): TNR Investors, L.L.C.

Prepared By(s): SWCA Environmental Consultants

Submitted To(s): Town of Marana

Record Identifiers

SWCA Project No. (s): 12637-052

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