Local Politicking

I had a fascinating evening tonight. (Knitting content soon, I SWEAR).

My Mom and I went to the town meeting about Montano Blvd. For the non locals, Albuquerque is town split down the middle by the Rio Grande. The part of town west of the river is BOOMING- major development. But NO infrastructure. Montano Blvd is one of the few bridges across the Rio Grande, and is a MAJOR cross town artery. We live ON Montano, between the river and the first major intersection east of the river.

The bridge was built for 4 lanes, 2 each direction, but was striped for only 1 lane each way. Montano cuts through the wealthiest part of Albuquerque, home of lots of rich people with land interests that go back forever. There have been major lawsuits over restriping the road. Back in last October, a court finally decided the restriping to 4 lands could go forward, and the Mayor got his crews out THAT NIGHT and got the job done.

Well, the rich folks got together and pointed out that the regional transportation board (not sure who this is, exactly), never amended the regional transportation plan, and that the restriping put the City in violation of that plan. This apparently jeopardizing millions of dollars worth of federal transportation dollars.

So, they put up orange barrels last week, restricting traffic to one lane each direction. And all the people who commute along this road think that our neighborhood wants only 2 lanes, so they've starting honking their car horns all the way along Montano, to let us know how displeased they are with the 2 lanes. The honking starts about 5:00 in the morning, and goes on every 5 minutes or so until after I leave for school, and continues until 11:00 at night.

Tonight was a public meeting in front of the transportation board, and it was fascinating! Lots of strong opinions on both sides. I was fascinated to see all the creative solutions coming out of every day people- too bad the city isn't doing anything!

I personally think there's no way Montano can only be 2 lanes- we need all 4. Desperately. Immediately. NOW. Yesterday. Even though my bedroom window is about 30 feet from the highway, even though the traffic noise is annoying, we need 4 lanes. We also need more bridges across the river. Among other things.

Anyway, a lot to think about, INCLUDING the fact that my Mom may have met someone at the meeting. Wink wink, nudge, nudge....