Downtowns

The Albuquerque Journal has a couple of stories on downtowns today. Specifically, Rio Rancho and Albuquerque. They have a solid story on Rio Rancho's doomed boondoggle of a downtown far from civilization. This thing was a bad idea when it was floated and it is worse now. They built an arena that can't even get near breaking even and then a new City Hall nearby. This was supposed to bring in development. Fat Chance! I feel sorry for current Mayor Tom Swisstack and City Manager James Jimenez who now have to deal with the mess.

Then there is a comment in the Journal about downtown Albuquerque. It was about the number of drunks downtown. Well, that has always been a problem and part of the responsibility is the number of shelters downtown. Add to that the number busloads of released jail inmates that are dumped into downtown every day and you can see why things are not as they should be. Mayor Chavez has been less than supportive of the downtown revitalization but this is really causing problems, especially around the Alvarado Transportation Center and the Movie Theater Block.

I wonder what folks would think if all these homeless and addicts were dropped on the intersection of Academy and Eubank Streets. They Mayor would pay attention then.