Eubank Work To Close Road For Months

EUBANK CLOSING BETWEEN HOLLY AND WILSHIRE: Get ready for Eubank Boulevard reconstruction Phase 2.

Work officially begins today, and this section of the road will be totally closed to traffic starting Sept. 4. Construction will last through — take a deep breath — January.

The $2.1 million project will rebuild Eubank from Paseo del Norte to Wilshire Avenue. Between Paseo and Corona Avenue, Eubank will become “a two-lane divided collector roadway with a landscaped center median, curb and gutter, bicycle lanes, an asphalt paved multi-use pedestrian trail, and storm drainage improvements,” according to Bernalillo County, which is overseeing the construction.

Between Corona and Wilshire, Eubank will be “an undivided, rural two-lane residential roadway with bicycle lanes, storm drainage improvements and a paved multi-use pedestrian trail.”

So between now and January, how do you get there from here?

The county says in its news release that “access will be maintained to both the Altamonte Little League fields and the Ben Greiner soccer fields after 4 p.m. on Mondays through Fridays and all day on weekends. During this period, the only access to Altamonte fields will be north from the intersection of Eubank Boulevard and Paseo del Norte; and the only access to Ben Greiner soccer field will be from Holbrook Avenue, and then east on Corona Avenue to the soccer fields.

“Local traffic is urged to use either Holbrook Avenue or Browning Avenue as a detour route during construction.”

CITE THE MOTORCYCLISTS WHO BUST MY EARDRUMS: A former law enforcement officer and Harley rider asks via email “why law enforcement, both police and sheriff, do not write tickets for all the motorcycles that have no mufflers or highly altered exhaust. Harley Davidson estimates that 75 to 80 percent of its motorcycles have altered exhaust, and even they are asking riders to back off as Harley is taking heat for the noise infractions. …

“I do not go along with the riders’ reasoning that ‘Loud is Alive.’ Don’t ride in blind spots and you won’t get run over. Motorcycles are not the safest means of transportation on the road, but there is no reason why the rest of us should have to go deaf because you have to impress everyone with how loud you are. We, the rest of society, are fed up with it and the lack of enforcing existing laws.”

Our reader goes on to say he has “spoken with the local police and some of them don’t even know that it is against the law. The others state that they would need a decibel meter in order for the citation to be valid. That may be true when a doubt is there, but when a vehicle has no muffler — easy to see — or when the exhaust pipe is stamped “for off-road use only,” a citation could and should be written. The word would go out, and exhausts would be put back the way the manufacturer designed them. California and Arizona have these same laws, and they are strictly enforcing them.

The New Mexico statute is 66-3-844, subsections A and C, located under registration laws.

In 2008, the head of the Albuquerque Police Department Traffic Unit explained that according to “66-3-844, a vehicle is required to be equipped with a muffler to prevent excessive or unusual noise. A motorcycle without a muffler is an obvious violation and will usually result in a quick ticket.” In the case of illegal after-market jobs, it’s “difficult to prove that it is in fact ‘excessive’ without a decibel meter. This leaves it up to the opinion of the officer and the interpretation of the court.

“That being said, this is a quality-of-life issue, and police officers are sensitive to this complaint, as well as loud music and other activities that can cause discomfort to neighborhoods. The Albuquerque Police Department does conduct tactical operations in areas where a lot of vehicles of this description tend to congregate, and we have had much success. Two examples of this are the Montgomery corridor and West Central.”

The same goes in 2012. APD spokesman Robert Gibbs says “citizens can call their respective APD substation regarding requests and/or concerns” for specific types of enforcement.

AND STOP STILL MEANS STOP: Finally, Marcia Bloom asks via email “when did the law change to make rolling stops acceptable?”

It didn’t — that would have been a front-page story for sure — but one drive across the metro area and it’s easy to see why she would ask.

Assistant editorial page editor D’Val Westphal tackles commuter issues for the Metro area on Mondays and West Siders and Rio Ranchoans on Thursdays. Reach her at 823-3858; road@abqjournal.com; P.O. Drawer J, Albuquerque, NM 87103; or go to ABQjournal.com/traffic to read previous columns and join in the conversation.
— This article appeared on page C8 of the Albuquerque Journal