New Mexico signs on to new interstate highway

Senator Ben Ray Lujan (D-NM) is cosponsor of S.992, A bill to amend the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act of 1991 and formally name the Ports-to-Plains Corridor Interstate 27. 

Signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2022 as part of the federal appropriations bill funding is available for an existing portion of US 87 to become a newly constructed I-327 connecting I-27 at Dumas, Texas with I-25 at Raton, New Mexico. 

According to the Ports-to-Plains Alliance I-27 would someday connect with the Heartland Expressway at Limon, Colorado at the intersection of I-70 and State Highway 71 then cross I-76 at Brush and I-80 at Kimball, Nebraska. There is already a four lane from Kimball to Scottsbluff so the proposal is to go east from there to US 385 then north through Alliance. The system would ultimately connect to the Theodore Roosevelt Expressway at Rapid City and reach the Canadian border at Raymond, Montana. 

In August, 2017 this blog proposed an interstate highway that would connect I-25 at Trinidad, Colorado to Rapid City, South Dakota. 

Learn more at the Los Alamos Daily Post.