THE SINGING ARROW STREET PROBLEM, AND HOW TO FIX IT
The 4 Hills Mobile Home Park is a "Private Community", established about 40 years ago
in an area in far southeast Albuquerque. Being a private community, it is surrounded by a six
foot high block wall that establishes its perimeter. South Juan Tabo Street is the park's main
vehicle thoroughfare. Within the park there are many small streets, all of which have a speed
limit of 10 mph., adequate for the safety of all the residents, many of whom walk from place to
place. However, about 30 years ago, Singing Arrow street, going east and west in the middle of
the park, was modified for purposes of busses (mostly school busses) being able to enter and exit
the park on the east side of the perimeter. An opening was cut in the wall to allow Singing
Arrow street to leave the park going east into a rather small, slightly populated area that would
become several blocks large in following years.
Now days, herein lies the problem. While the rest of the park speed limit remained (and
still remains) 10 mph, Singing Arrow Street was given a 25mph speed limit. As the years have
gone by, the residential area to the east of the park has enlarged and become more heavily
populated, and many of the residents who live therein have made Singing Arrow street a major
thoroughfare heading west, and they use it a lot. There are two other streets in their area that
provide simple exits for them to Central Avenue from which they can get to work or wherever
else they might be going. But many of them are still using Singing Arrow, and this has become a
safety problem for 4 Hills Mobile Park residents, many of whom are young children, who walk to
and from the three park recreational centers to swim, play basketball, ping pong, billiards, etc.
The "now heavy" motor vehicle back and forth use on Singing Arrow is noisy, and scary at times
because many of the users exceed the 25 mph speed limit. The Park management needs to do
something about this very significant situation, and we have a suggestion that will fix it.
A few of us residents in the park use the Singing Arrow exit through the east wall to go up
to the Tramway area shopping centers. But it only takes maybe a couple of minutes longer to
exit the park onto Juan Tabo street, and go over to Central, make a right turn and go up to
Tramway where the stores are. If we all did that, we could close the hole in the east wall at
Singing Arrow, and the problem is eliminated. We recommend that there still remain a small
sidewalk walkthrough at the Singing Arrow east wall exit location, and folks could stroll east to
exercise and/or go shopping over there. But if vehicles couldn't go through, our problem would
be taken care of.
If this were to happen, the city would ask the Park Owners for some money to "buy our"
short, three blocks of Singing Arrow, but somehow that could be taken care of.
The Park Manager agrees with us that to wall off the east end of Singing Arrow to
vehicles would be a good idea. When asked recently, the Park Owner also thought so, but
wanted to know what all the residents of the park think of this situation, and how they would
vote. So that is what this letter is all about. We want every park resident to think about this
solution to a significant safety problem, and let us know if they would want or not want the east
end of Singing Arrow closed off to vehicular traffic, but left open to sidewalk use. We'll be
contacting all park residents soon to determine their endorsement or lack thereof for this
solution. Remember, we need your help to correct this very serious safety situation.
PLEASE INDICATE IF YOU ARE IN FAVOR OF THIS PROPOSAL
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