Mayor Marty Strikes Again

Mikaela says:
This time, in the dead of night. This time, Montano Bridge. Yessirree, boys and girls. Following through on his campaign promise, Mayor Marty has managed to re-stripe the Montano Bridge to 4 lanes. He's working on striping the rest of Montano from the bridge west to Coors. Silly historic neighborhoods are still in his way on that one, but they, too, will soon fall to his will. Nice summary in the Trib yesterday, with timeline of historic events.

Is it any wonder that two of the most controversial decisions Marty's made in his 100 years or so in office -- oh, sorry, just feels like that -- let's see 1, 2, 3, 4 for term 1, then 5, 6, 7, 8 for term 2 after 4 years of Baca and now 9 for term 3, my bad! -- okay 9 years in office revolve around serving Westside growth?

Hmmm... Is it just coincidence that Mayor Marty served as the Westside representative when he served in the NM legislature?

• Or that he's suspiciously tied to development interests on the Westside and along arteries connecting Westside residents to eastside business centers?
  
• Or that he was the Mayor in office when the 30-year controversy surrounding an additional bridge crossing in the North Valley ended with bulldozers clearing 100-year old cottonwoods to start Montano Bridge's construction?
  
• Or that it was on his watch that the 2-lane bridge that the neighbors, environmentalists, and Corp of Engineers finally agreed to was actually constructed to be wide enough to 4 lanes (even though that meant the EIS performed was thereby invalidated, making the Bridge illegal)?
  
• Or that one of his first moves after coming back into office was promising to re-stripe to 4 lanes?
  
• Or that he declared that intention publicly less than a month after a coalition of neighborhood residents and businesses came together for a community visioning workshop to decide the future of their area?
  

No matter that this re-striping goes against the City's own agreements to do planning studies and traffic improvement measures before moving forward. No matter that recent reports just concluded offer contradictory evidence about the traffic impact on the surrounding neighborhoods. No matter that surrounding neighborhoods are vehemently opposed to this re-striping and are trying desperately to get themselves organized and figure out what THEY want for their community.

Cause let's be honest people, who cares about residents? Who cares about neighborhoods? Not Marty! Well, okay, maybe he cares a little bit for the residents who live on the Westside who serve as his political base. Maybe they make the cut.

The simple truth is that Mayor Marty wanted what Mayor Marty wanted, and that's unfettered expansion of Albuquerque's Westside. Let's not muck up those waters with any other claims. He may say we need to get past this whole east vs. west debate, but as any traffic engineer or any resident living anywhere NEAR 4th and Montano will tell you, expanding roads only INCREASES congestion. The more capacity you provide, the quicker it will fill. Widening Montano Bridge throws lighter fluid on the flames of Westside growth pressures. That's the truth.

Thanks, Marty, for your visionary leadership and unthinking quickness to move on what you know is wrong in the dead of night.

When the traffic gets even worse, and the Westside sprawls even more, we'll all know who to thank.

P.S. Yes, a tiny little piece of my bitterness comes from needing now to revise the entire first chapter of my thesis. Had he waited and done things LEGALLY, I might have had time to graduate first... But my bigger bitterness is for the loss of quality of life and sense of place for the neighborhoods surrounding 4th and Montano, whose struggle to gain control over their own community just got that much harder.