Have you ever decided to do a minor remodel on your house, maybe fix up a bathroom or replace the 70s shag carpeting, and in the middle of that project somehow have 40, maybe $80 million dollars drop into your lap? In such cases, you’ve changed the project, haven’t you? Expanded the scope, maybe gone with the solid gold Delta-brand faucets instead of the brushed metal knock-offs.

It’s the same, apparently, with the proposed, kinda-sorta started, Albuquerque Rail Trail. What was once, realistically, just a proposed multi-use path along/near the train tracks north from the Rail Yards to Lomas, with lofty dreams and renderings of a loop through Wells Park, Sawmill, Bosque Path and back, has expanded in realizable scope due to a number of factors. Numbers like 40,000,000.

For historical context, here’s how KOB-TV’s Patrick Hayes, with Mayor Keller’s help, interestingly, and somewhat prophetically, described the Rail Trail funding situation in May of 2021.

“The city has $140 million worth of projects in 2021 including a Rail Trail that will connect the Rail Yards to east downtown Albuquerque.

The new path would let people walk or ride their bikes over train tracks.

The $5 million project (BB emphasis) is still in the design phase.

The proposed skyscraper at 4th and Marquette will not be funded in this latest investment project.

Keller said developing the property would have cost taxpayers too much money.

‘I was really excited about the opportunity for that project but unfortunately all the proposals have had a $50 to $80 million hole, so unless we find $80 million, we want to spend on those, I think we’ll revisit it in hopefully a second term,’ Keller said.”

Later in Summer 2021, your humble blogger and quite a few other folks braved the pandemic to attend a “meeting” at Rail Yards with renderings on easels and little colored dots to express preferences about the Rail Trail. Nobody there was using dollar figures like $80 million and much of the chat/questions with City/contractor representatives at each easel were about how we were gonna talk BNSF into loosening up their 25-foot right of way limit and how insanely unrealistic an elevated solution to BNSF was.

Funny thing, money can make the insane perfectly reasonable.

For example, if one of those renderings at the Summer 2021 public meeting had looked anything like this view of a grade-level plus Central Avenue crossing complete with tumbleweed orb:

Or especially said orb at night:

And had another rendering featuring this view of the proposed elevated portion:

Most, if not all attendees at said Summer 2021 public meeting would have laughed hard to the point of passing out in their N-95 masks. Remember, this was prior to even the new grade-level crossing at Marquette and the train tracks, which seemed marvelous at the time and still does. But there’s no orb.

Yet now, having combined $10 million from the State, $11.5 million from a Federal RAISE Grant, and $15 million from itself (i.e., taxpayers in ABQ. We County residents thank you!), the City has $36.5 million in pocket and, sensing funding blood in the water, seems pretty optimistic it can round up its identified need of $80 million.

Two quick observations before your humble blogger continues to try wrapping their head around orbs (you had me at “grade-level Central Avenue crossing”) and “Auras.”

1. I stole all the rendering graphics above from a piece about all this by Peter Rice and the great folks at Downtown Albuquerque News, which you should really read and subscribe to as early and often as possible. DAN’s write up of the latest on the Rail Trail is required reading.
2. While the visioning stolen by me above is the work of famed architect Antoine Predock, there’s a definite Meow Wolf vibe wafting through it all (see colors in map above)l. If implemented, will Antoine Predock/Meow Wolf does transportation neo-60s optimism result in widespread, sustainable use of the Rail Trail by walkers and rollers of all ages and a meaningful boon to our long-suffering downtown core?

I don’t know.

I’m still wrapping my head around $36.5, maybe $80 million. And very much still wrapping my head around how walkers and rollers are supposed to get to, from, and through this moving Meow Wolf. For instance, getting from the “Aura of Industry” to the “Aura of Enchantment” involves crossing the Lomas “Aura of Conflict Point” on 1st Avenue (at least that’s the way it looks and how it was first imagined back before $80 million. And how does one get to these Auras from auras neighborhoods outside the downtown core without getting killed?

Let me consult the orb some more and get back to you on a more realized “position” about all this. For now, let’s just all admit it’s fun to talk about multi-modal projects with double-figure millions being tossed about. Those of us who’ve heard countless gnashing of teeth and objections to safety improvements totalling far, far, almost infinitely far less (e.g. the just-removed crossing of Rio Grande Blvd. at Hollywood) need a bit of time to adjust to the fun, our lingering resentment over somewhat similar figures being dismissed as crazy for projects such as a bike/ped bridge at Silver and I-25, and the possibilities.