The possibility that the desert bordering Ahwatukee Foothills could one day become a freeway has existed almost as long as the community itself.

This week, for the first time in the project's nearly two-decade history, Ahwatukee residents will be able to compare rumor to the reality of what the proposed Loop 202 could look like if or when it is built. They will be able to ask questions and register their opinions on the public record.

The meeting is expected to be emotional for the hundreds of homeowners and families who could see their community radically changed by the long-planned and much-debated freeway.  

"It's a process folks work through, from shock, to surprise, to anger," ADOT spokesman Matt Burdick said.

More than 1,000 people are expected at the Grace Inn on Thursday for an eight-hour open house hosted by the Arizona Department of Transportation. The main attraction will be a series of enlarged aerial photographs showing the routes that the proposed South Mountain Freeway could take in Ahwatukee Foothills and the West Valley.

They are detailed enough that residents will be able to tell whether individual homes and buildings fall within the boundary of properties that ADOT believes it will need to acquire if the freeway is built. As currently designed, it could claim up to 250 to 300 houses and condominiums in Ahwatukee.

Neighborhoods and communities are rallying their members in anticipation of the open house.

"I'm telling people not only to attend that meeting but to speak with a loud voice and be vocal," Councilman Greg Stanton said.

In the Foothills Reserve, a new community of semicustom homes that could be partially bulldozed to make room for the highway, the freeway is the topic of choice among neighbors, one resident said.

"Every time we run into someone, the conversation always points that way," Ty RamotarSingh said.

At Mountain Park Community Church off 24th Street and Pecos Road, a notice encouraging worshipers to attend Thursday's meeting ran in the church bulletin at Sunday services. The church sits squarely in the freeway's footprint.

Though church officials knew when they built their house of worship in the early 1990s that the freeway was planned nearby, they are hoping to save their church, facilities manager Dave Swisher said.

"Because of the views and the situation we have, we would like to stay here," he said.

San Riva at the Foothills, a former apartment complex recently converted to condominiums, opened to potential buyers at 10 a.m. Friday. At 10:20 a.m., management learned that the freeway could raze as many as 100 units in the complex.

Managers said they planned to attend Thursday's meeting to voice opposition to the plan.

"We're trying to sell a lifestyle here, and it's tough to sell a lifestyle in the middle of a freeway," project director Ben Henrich said.

For many residents, the freeway appears to threaten the very lifestyle that drew them to Ahwatukee in the first place - quiet, cozy neighborhoods ringed by beautiful desert views and a sense of isolation from the rest of the Valley.

ADOT officials said that many Ahwatukee residents whose commute could be improved by a direct route from Ahwatukee to the West Valley have still expressed opposition to the freeway, saying that they prefer a longer drive to a loss of quality of life.

Michael Argeline is one such resident. His work in security video surveillance takes him frequently to the West Valley. Standing in the back yard of his home off 32nd Street and Pecos, he said he would rather keep a long commute than disrupt his neighborhood.

"It would just totally ruin the feel of the community here," he said of the freeway.

Similar meetings are scheduled in the West Valley. City governments, property owners and developers there are debating three route alternatives connecting the proposed freeway to Interstate 10, each affecting scores of businesses and homes.

In Ahwatukee, residents will be able to consider two scenarios Thursday: building the freeway along what is now Pecos Road or not building the freeway at all.

Despite protests from Ahwatukee residents and representatives urging ADOT to move the freeway south, the Gila River Indian Community has not consented to any study of a freeway alignment on their land.

Though engineers have said that the route shown at this week's meetings is close to the freeway that ADOT would like to build, it is possible that ADOT could alter the plans based on public input.

Late last week, planners removed an interchange at 32nd Street after objections from residents and city officials.

Though some in the neighborhood were relieved that their homes were spared, others said they would rather be bought out than be stuck with a home in the shadow of a freeway.

Richard Slapke said he will be at Thursday's meeting. He is among those objecting to the impact the freeway will have on his neighborhood, a tight-knit community that abuts Pecos Road at 32nd Street. Though the freeway may bypass his house, he said he can't imagine who but the city would buy from him.

"Take it, 'cause I can't sell it," he said.