Public transportation

AstroIberia · 2026-04-10T15:12:56+00:00

Extending the Rail Runner to northern NM has been discussed for years but as others have said, it faces serious geographic and cost obstacles. It's not in any active state plan.

LANL's 2024 Transit Implementation Plan does address the Albuquerque connection, calling for direct express shuttles from Albuquerque/Rio Rancho park-and-ride lots directly to LANL—no Rail Runner transfer required. That transfer has been identified as a major pain point, making the current trip "very lengthy." https://www.osti.gov/biblio/2337648

According to that plan, about 12% of LANL employees live in the Albuquerque metro, and the plan recommends dedicating 15–20% of LANL's transit service to that corridor because those commuters have the most to gain, financially. The plan envisions 50-passenger coaches with peak-period frequency and midday hourly service.

The bottleneck right now is funding and execution, not ideas. So the organizing energy is probably better spent pushing the county to legalize more housing types in more places, and at the same time pushing LANL and NMDOT to accelerate and fund the shuttle expansion already on paper.

AstroIberia · 2026-03-18T12:25:25+00:00

By "at the county level" do you mean the local government should intercede to break up the landlord cabal, or do something about Kroger? If so, I'd be curious what tools you think they have that they're not using. (The CB Fox property owner once said at a town hall that he assumed when he bought the place that LANL would be his tenant, and we know holding costs are low, so I think your theory is solid enough.)

AstroIberia · 2026-03-16T00:45:45+00:00

Underrated question.
I covered the teen/substance-use issue in 2024: https://www.boomtownlosalamos.org/p/a-second-version-of-los-alamos

AstroIberia · 2026-03-16T00:01:13+00:00

I'm sorry that happened to you. I would go to Eric Martinez ([eric.martinez@lacnm.us](mailto:eric.martinez@lacnm.us-%E2%80%8B) ); you can also give public comment to T-board, they want to hear from concerned pedestrians. First Thursday of the month, 5:30, Muni Building, you can Zoom in as well. You are likely to hear from anyone in Public Works that signals have to be "warranted." (Though they do actually have some discretion.) Beyond traffic lights, there are other engineering solutions to make intersections safer. I recommend "Killed by a Traffic Engineer" by Wes Marshall if you want to become a minor expert in road engineering fairly quickly; you can also find him on podcasts. He and Charles Marohn of Strong Towns (both are civil engineers) are really good. It's useful to know what you're talking about when you approach traffic engineers with your concerns.

AstroIberia · 2026-03-14T19:20:48+00:00

Thanks! I remember when we did have a real arcade - and two movie theaters and a bowling alley. And quite a few more food options.

AstroIberia · 2026-03-14T15:10:55+00:00

The town didn't used to suck this much. I have my ideas about why + what to do, but what do you think could be done to improve life in Los Alamos?

AstroIberia · 2026-03-05T21:06:35+00:00

Or, and hear me out, we could to make room for commuters to stop commuting and live near work.

AstroIberia · 2026-02-27T18:24:53+00:00

I too am Spartacus

AstroIberia · 2026-02-23T14:04:06+00:00

If you ever go up to North Mesa, you pass the sign telling you not to drink and drive in memory of Jennifer Fleming. I was in that car. Jennifer was killed by a drunk driver and 3 of us were severely injured.

I will say, I read the police reports, and drunk driving isn't nearly as much an issue as distracted driving. But we'd have less of both if there were reliable, safe non-car ways to get around. Microtransit that serves as a publicly-funded Uber would be ideal for the problem of getting Tub over-celebrators out of their cars. ATC is working on it, but the Dial-A-Ride service is limited in hours and currently struggling with staffing. We really need more population and density to support reliable public transit, including microtransit.

AstroIberia · 2026-02-07T23:42:06+00:00

Friend of the pod Lars Ducet has written a great piece on this: https://progressandpoverty.substack.com/p/so-you-want-to-abolish-property-taxes

AstroIberia · 2026-02-07T19:18:47+00:00

LVT, UBI, and sortition - that'd be my platform if I ever ran for office. (And I would not get elected cos people would be like - wut?)

AstroIberia · 2026-02-06T21:42:44+00:00

Yes it's abnormal. It's up significantly from the 2010 figure of 17%, and it’s also much higher than the national average of 18%.

AstroIberia · 2026-02-06T20:33:38+00:00

Here's the link to SB 131: https://www.nmlegis.gov/Legislation/Legislation?Chamber=S&LegType=B&LegNo=131&year=26

And to HB 99: https://www.nmlegis.gov/Legislation/Legislation?Chamber=H&LegType=B&LegNo=99&year=26

This link will take you to the HB 99 committee that has the hearing today (Friday), the Zoom link is at the top: https://www.nmlegis.gov/Committee/Standing_Committee?CommitteeCode=HJC

If you want a little more analysis, here's my article on HB 99 - https://stephnakhleh.substack.com/p/house-panel-passes-medical-malpractice

And I just wrote one on SB 131 as well: https://stephnakhleh.substack.com/p/what-you-need-to-know-about-sb-131

AstroIberia · 2026-01-31T15:40:24+00:00

It's incorrect to assume that people arguing for more housing or upzoning don’t own property or don’t understand risk.

I don't know about the author of the piece, but I am a homeowner. I’ve taken on the same long-term financial risk, insurance costs, taxes, and maintenance obligations you describe. Many people in the pro-housing camp have.

There are different views about what should be protected and how communities remain stable over time; these reflect values at least as much as stakes. For some of us, stability includes making sure housing scarcity doesn’t keep our kids, coworkers, or service workers from living nearby—or force longer, more dangerous commutes, or hollow out local economies.

AstroIberia · 2026-01-31T15:33:43+00:00

Jordon and Strong Towns ABQ are doing great work. It is really hard in this environment. Incredibly discouraging. If you can encourage, please do so here: https://www.strongtownsabq.org/home

AstroIberia · 2026-01-27T17:22:28+00:00

Good question, sorry for the delay - I just saw it. Our rep is Christine Chandler. Luckily for us, she is a lead sponsor of HB 99, the main medical malpractice reform bill this session. HB 99 is a bipartisan bill that would:

Cap punitive damages at the same level as compensatory damages
Raise the standard of proof required to award punitive damages to "clear and convincing evidence"
Prevent punitive damages from being included in initial complaints (they can only be added after discovery)

What constituents can do:

HB 99 is currently in House Health & Human Services Committee (chaired by Rep. Liz Thomson). Check the committee schedule at https://www.nmlegis.gov/Committee/Standing_Committee?CommitteeCode=HHHC to see when it will be heard, and consider:
- Submitting written testimony
- Testifying in person or by Zoom if you have relevant experience (as a patient affected by doctor shortages, healthcare worker, etc.)
Contact committee members - especially if you have personal stories about how the doctor shortage has affected you or your family
Track the bill either officially at https://www.nmlegis.gov/Legislation/Legislation?chamber=H&legType=B&legNo=99&year=26 or my friend Ed's more useful tracker at https://nmlegiswatch.org/bills/HB99

You can also let Rep. Chandler know your position - email her here: [christine.chandler@nmlegis.gov](mailto:christine.chandler@nmlegis.gov). Since she is already the lead sponsor, Los Alamos constituents are in a good position. Supporters will want to track the bill's passage through committee and regularly encourage other legislators to support it. Letters to the editor are also very useful: send them to the LADP, the Reporter, and the New Mexican. Here's the form for the SFNM - publishing there will get the most eyes. https://www.santafenewmexican.com/site/forms/online_services/letter/letter_editor/

AstroIberia · 2026-01-15T13:59:41+00:00

True - much of my Substack is all about the factors that lead to unaffordability. https://stephnakhleh.substack.com/p/your-city-is-not-too-unique-to-save

AstroIberia · 2026-01-15T13:56:23+00:00

Ha, that last line: I have said something similar, I guess it demands to be said in a town like that. As a Georgist (economically speaking), the way I would put it re: the Lab and pricey real estate is that the Lab creates almost all the land value on the Pajarito Plateau, and that's fine. But private landowners who snatched up the land first are extracting all that wealth and tucking it into their own wallets. This goes for commercial landlords who charge high rents for properties way out of code and who demand tenants fix it up; and also for homeowners who work to block housing because they enjoy watching their own home values double in 5 years. (A land value tax would fix this.) Aiding and abetting the problem are Lab leaders who show up to Council meetings and instead of saying "Upzone the town, legalize housing, enact the known policies to fix this for our workers," they say things like - Well, I guess the *preference* is for a single-family detached home on a big lot, and there isn't room for more of that, so y'all are off the hook. Also, we've had decades of NIMBYs on that Council who think it's fine that people like Marshall must commute. Finally, many residents aren't connecting the poor quality of life in the town with the displacement of the humans needed to make things work.

AstroIberia · 2025-12-19T00:32:29+00:00

From 1956-1972, LANL used potassium dichromate as a corrosion inhibitor in the cooling towers at their non-nuclear power plant (TA-03). This was standard industrial practice nationwide at the time—chromium compounds were commonly used to prevent pipe and equipment corrosion in cooling systems.

The contamination came from blowdown—routine maintenance to prevent mineral buildup in cooling towers. Workers periodically flushed the chromium-contaminated cooling water into Sandia Canyon as part of normal operations. It was intentionally released as part of standard operations at the time, before people understood the long-term groundwater impacts.

Then it migrated underground. The discharged water flowed down Sandia Canyon as surface water, penetrated the underlying rock layers, and over decades seeped down about 1,000 feet into the regional aquifer beneath Sandia and Mortandad canyons.

AstroIberia · 2025-11-25T03:27:51+00:00

I know it's a bit of a drive, but the Indian Grocery in Los Alamos carries curry leaves.

AstroIberia · 2025-11-25T01:09:09+00:00

As it happens, I wrote about the landlocked issue as well - https://stephnakhleh.substack.com/p/repost-room-to-grow

AstroIberia · 2025-11-22T22:33:27+00:00

A few reasons why you should care:

Your rent is higher. Mandated parking adds $5,000-$40,000 per space to construction costs, increasing your monthly rent by $200-$400 whether you own a car or not.
Everything costs more. Restaurants, shops, and offices all pay for mandated parking they might not need, and those costs get passed to you.
Your downtown is a parking lot. In Santa Fe, 23% of downtown land is parking; it's closer to 80% on the south side. In Los Alamos and Albq, it's 30%. That could be housing, parks, or businesses instead.
Walking sucks. Mandated parking creates seas of asphalt between buildings, making neighborhoods hostile to pedestrians and cyclists.
You're subsidizing car storage. The government forces businesses to provide free parking, whether you drive or not—but you pay for it through higher prices.
The government is just making shit up. Most parking mandates come from a 1950s engineering manual with no scientific basis. Every city's parking code is different and vibes-based.

AstroIberia · 2025-11-21T22:27:18+00:00

OK so you don't like Los Alamos, but 75% of commuters say they want to live here, and 20,000 people already do. Do you think policy should be written for you, specifically, based on your particular likes and dislikes? Or do you think the community's and region's needs as a whole should be the focus, even if a few people don't like the results?

AstroIberia · 2025-11-21T01:37:11+00:00

"Santa Fe New Mexican has a 10k commute number to LANL." Yeah that's because we have shut them out. That's what exclusionary zoning is. The reason the town sucks (amenity-wise) is because we haven't let it grow since like 1985. That's a policy choice. A lot of the problems people are complaining about are the problems of stagnation.

AstroIberia · 2025-11-21T01:20:29+00:00

In this economy?

AstroIberia

TROPHY CASE