Goldberg worked with the team of Smith Group/JJR and Floor Associates to create easy, comfortable pedestrian access to the museum from the Valley Metro Light Rail 44th Street stop. He designed the 30'-high portal with bands of red and grey granite to celebrate the rich legacy of Hohokam red on buff pottery. Goldberg based the pattern on the pre-rusted steel entry gates on what is thought, by some, to be a Hohokam symbol for water. Beyond the portal, the path to the Museum leads visitors to a 40' circular plaza of patterned granite surrounded by saguaros and large boulders. Ironwood and mesquite trees shade the remaining stretch of path to the Museum.
