New Mexico's Oil Boom

[kphoger]

I don't know, I've always associated New Mexico with more supposed "Texas-like" attributes than I do with Texas.  New Mexico has oil, ranching, desert and wilderness in droves.  Sure western Texas is also like that, but the eastern part is Florida Junior. 

I guess my perception is that New Mexico is closer in reality to what most people perceive Texas to be. 

From the movie The Cowboy Way (1994):

— Where you guys from?  Texas?

— Texas?  Ain't no real cowboys from Texas.  We're from New Mexico.

[kernals12]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

[JayhawkCO]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

[kernals12]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

I stayed there overnight when I was moving from Boston to Phoenix.

[JayhawkCO]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

I stayed there overnight when I was moving from Boston to Phoenix.

Most of the interstate drives are pretty boring. You have to get off the beaten path a bit to find the good places.

[kernals12]

Another thing that surprised me about New Mexico is that its name wasn't just something made up by the Americans when they couldn't think of any other name for the territory they just annexed from Mexico. The term goes back to the 16th century when the Spanish noted how the Mexica people migrated north to "Nuevo Mexico".

[Big John]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

Just remember to make the left turn there.

[Scott5114]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

I stayed there overnight when I was moving from Boston to Phoenix.

Most of the interstate drives are pretty boring. You have to get off the beaten path a bit to find the good places.

That's the feeling I've always gotten driving through on I-40—like it's an interesting place I've just barely scratched the surface of.

[Max Rockatansky]

Off Interstate New Mexico is a top ten state for cool roads and scenery.

[Bruce]

The half-day I spent in Santa Fe was rather enjoyable on foot. The state also has one of the few state-run intercity passenger rail services, and it runs more than just peak hours.

[kkt]

I've always wondered about this. Unlike most petroleum producing states, New Mexico is a political blue state. This might mean that policy wise, alternative energy sources would get prioritized over oil and gas. But it's also presumable that in spite of that, oil and gas still pay a lot of the state's bills. I wonder how the state balances these competing factors (or if they do).

Politicians have very, very little control over energy production, short of outright bans.

A lot of the oil is under public lands and can't be drilled without a public lease.

[kkt]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

I stayed there overnight when I was moving from Boston to Phoenix.

Most of the interstate drives are pretty boring. You have to get off the beaten path a bit to find the good places.

That's the feeling I've always gotten driving through on I-40—like it's an interesting place I've just barely scratched the surface of.

Which is true of most any state when you just drive through on an interstate.

[Bobby5280]

That's a strange conspiracy theory given LA has been littered with oil derricks over the decades.  Everyone knows about it and you'd be surprised how well oil wells are disguised within city limits.

While many of the old oil wells are decommissioned the city still has quite a few pipes they maintain to vent off natural gas from coming up from those old wells. They make some attempts to disguise those pipes. In other cases they don't.

[JayhawkCO]

The only thing that pops into my head when thinking of New Mexico is Breaking Bad. It's not a state one thinks about much.

My brother-in-law and his wife live in Albuquerque and I've gotten to spend a good amount of time in most areas of the state. It's one of my favorites.

I stayed there overnight when I was moving from Boston to Phoenix.

Most of the interstate drives are pretty boring. You have to get off the beaten path a bit to find the good places.

That's the feeling I've always gotten driving through on I-40—like it's an interesting place I've just barely scratched the surface of.

Which is true of most any state when you just drive through on an interstate.

The best stuff is always off of the interstate, but some states are very boring and not scenic on the interstate but very scenic off of the interstate. The main "candidates" for this are New Mexico, Wyoming, and Idaho. There are a couple of other lesser candidates too - Minnesota, Nebraska, and South Dakota come to mind.

[kphoger]

The interstate highway system is a wonderful thing. It makes it possible to go from coast to coast without seeing anything or meeting anybody. If the United States interests you, stay off the interstates.

[kernals12]

New Mexico is really something. In what other state can you find humble service stations advertised with 2 dozen billboards in each direction?

[Max Rockatansky]

New Mexico is really something. In what other state can you find humble service stations advertised with 2 dozen billboards in each direction?

If "The Thing" is still around you can find something similar on I-10 east of Tucson in Arizona.

[Scott5114]

New Mexico is really something. In what other state can you find humble service stations advertised with 2 dozen billboards in each direction?

Modern stations, even!

[kphoger]

Never would I ever . . . have thought so many people would praise New Mexico on a forum dominated by signage nit-pickers.

[Rothman]

Never would I ever . . . have thought so many people would praise New Mexico on a forum dominated by signage nit-pickers.

Roadgeekery and meth use have a high correlation.

[Max Rockatansky]

Never would I ever . . . have thought so many people would praise New Mexico on a forum dominated by signage nit-pickers.

I'm more in this hobby for interesting drives.  That coupled with the fact I worked in said state for three years goes a long way to explain why it is a personal favorite.

[JayhawkCO]

Never would I ever . . . have thought so many people would praise New Mexico on a forum dominated by signage nit-pickers.

New Mexico feels like the underdog state to me. Not going to pick on it as much as Oklahoma which feels like it's trying to punch above its weight.

[Max Rockatansky]

Never would I ever . . . have thought so many people would praise New Mexico on a forum dominated by signage nit-pickers.

New Mexico feels like the underdog state to me. Not going to pick on it as much as Oklahoma which feels like it's trying to punch above its weight.

The signage between Oklahoma and New Mexico tends to run on the same levels of bad.  New Mexico probably gets a pass because it isn't as well charged out as New Mexico by the road fandom. 

That said the state that really gets overlooked for bad signage is Hawaii.  That state is all over the place and it might not be apparent how much is off if one sticks to Intestates on Oahu (like most road fans do).

[kphoger]

The signage between Oklahoma and New Mexico tends to run on the same levels of bad.  New Mexico probably gets a pass because it isn't as well charged out as New Mexico by the road fandom.

No, they're not the same level of bad.  Oklahoma signage is cringe-worthy because of how it looks.  I don't trust New Mexico signage to even be useful.

As Scott put it:

I mean, if there's a beautifully designed, constructed and maintained road that happens to run right between your origin and destination points, it still is completely useless if you can't find the damn thing.

ODOT signage is æsthetically garbage, violates norms of both graphic design and traffic control, and hurts your eyes to look at. But it's almost always there, and it's usually complete and mostly correct. ODOT signage sucks, but you can at least navigate with it. NMDOT sometimes can't even manage to clear that simple bar, to the point that it starts to negatively impact navigability. So there's a pretty good argument that NMDOT is worse than ODOT.

[Max Rockatansky]

The signage between Oklahoma and New Mexico tends to run on the same levels of bad.  New Mexico probably gets a pass because it isn't as well charged out as New Mexico by the road fandom.

No, they're not the same level of bad.  Oklahoma signage is cringe-worthy because of how it looks.  I don't trust New Mexico signage to even be useful.

As Scott put it:

I mean, if there's a beautifully designed, constructed and maintained road that happens to run right between your origin and destination points, it still is completely useless if you can't find the damn thing.

ODOT signage is æsthetically garbage, violates norms of both graphic design and traffic control, and hurts your eyes to look at. But it's almost always there, and it's usually complete and mostly correct. ODOT signage sucks, but you can at least navigate with it. NMDOT sometimes can't even manage to clear that simple bar, to the point that it starts to negatively impact navigability. So there's a pretty good argument that NMDOT is worse than ODOT.

Signage does have a nasty habit of disappearing on you in NM.  One traveling somewhere rural would be well advised to really research where you are going (especially where to turn).  There was a whole bunch of highways east of Alamogordo that I can think of that had signage spawn in and out existence when it was needed most. 

Come to think of it no wonder I feel so at home navigating the Letter County Routes in California and stuff in Hawaii.  They basically are the New Mexico signage experience replicated.