Ever found yourself on a walk, roll, or bicycle at a place in town that got you dreaming, “jeez, if there was only a bridge over this roadway infrastructural hellhole I am currently experiencing”? Just to pick one of many possible for instances, maybe you’ve been coming down Lead Avenue westbound approaching I-25 and thought, “sure would be dreamy if there was a bike/ped bridge over the Interstate instead of what I’m about to experience!”

Lead is just one of literally countless for instances around town. We could try to list/count them all, but that would be silly because of the literally countless thing. Still, each of us who try to stay alive walking or rolling through town have our personal dreamiest bike/ped bridge dream.

And so it is with Terry Brunner and the folks at the City’s Metropolitan Redevelopment Agency, as related by Downtown Albuquerque News (DAN) this morning:

The city’s Metropolitan Redevelopment Agency is taking a serious look at routing the future Rail Trail on a bridge over Lomas Boulevard rather than crossing it at surface level, Director Terry Brunner told the Albuquerque Development Commission last month. 

The present configuration of the busy street inspired the discussion, Brunner told DAN later. Having pedestrians and bicyclists cross with the help of some sort of light would involve stopping a lot of traffic that is unaccustomed to stopping there. Then, he said, “Somebody had the idea, ‘why don’t we just go over it?'”

Those of you who’ve been involved with non-motorized roadway user advocacy might have shared my chuckle over “why don’t we just go over it?” How many times have we dreamt that question? Sometimes, in our reverie, the question has even accidentally slipped out loud, leading others within hearing (often presenting consultants at public meetings) to point out the myriad reasons why we “can’t just do that,” all of them expressly “there’s no money” and each of them with the unexpressed fact that zero political will exists to fulfill this dream.

Well, Terry Brunner and Co. have been empowered with the political will and DAN points out those folks have a federal grant application in that might pay for it. At least part of it. Maybe.

Is a bike/ped bridge over Lomas at the train tracks a common dream shared by many who walk and roll throughout town, or even that part of town? How many are wishing, hoping, and clamoring for a bridge there versus the many other spots in town where walker/rollers are dreaming such dreams daily? I dunno. My only personal input is that I commuted back and forth down 1st Avenue for about a year in the early 2020s, and the dream never occurred to me, personally, as I approached and crossed Lomas. It wasn’t great, but the light is set to require no beg button, and there are far, far worse crossings in town.

But that’s just one guy’s viewpoint and that guy, me, isn’t Director, or even Janitor, at the Metropolitan Redevelopment Agency. Nevertheless, reading today’s story at the DAN I got that Everly Brothers’ song stuck in my head, one that, as an older person, sometimes comes to me as I again approach one of the wickedly dangerous walker/roller crossings in town. In honor and memory of all who have ever inwardly thought and/or outwardly expressed the question “why don’t we just go over it?” here are the *Everlys.

The Everlys also perform “Cathy’s Clown” in the clip above and, if one wanted to extend a metaphor well past the breaking point, you might say “Clown” tells the story of the Rail Trail once Tim Keller isn’t Mayor anymore. But I digress and return to our main topic/tune and end with this excerpt of “Dream” lyrics:

I need you so that I could die
I love you so and that is why
Whenever I want you, all I have to do is
Dream, dream, dream, dream
Dream

Have a dreamy week, everybody.

*Apologies for the text and other irritants on the Everyly Brothers’ clip, but it’s the best one I could find in my seventeen seconds of looking.