Carlsbad

  Carlsbad is a pleasant little town, a veritable oasis in the desert. It is a tree studded town, but, of course, the majority of those trees were planted after the town was settled. The town was started by people who utilized irrigation water from the Pecos River and the town was initially called Eddy. The county that would later be created was also called Eddy and the town of Eddy
was named the county seat. After mineral springs were developed, the town became somewhat of a spa community. As a result, the residents of the town voted, in 1899, to change the town's name to Carlsbad because Karlsbad, Bohemia(now Karlovy Vary, Czech Republic), was a well known spa community at that time.
  Eventually, potash and oil were discovered in the area and then, after those discoveries were made, the most famous discovery was made---the Carlsbad Caverns. At first they were just called "The Bat Caves," and they are located about 20 miles south of Carlsbad. The
Carlsbad Caverns will be the topic of another blog entry.
  Meanwhile, back to Carlsbad itself. Even though it is currently experiencing a resurgence due to the ongoing oil boom, there are still signs of the prior difficult times the town had experienced. Before the oil boom started, the number of abandoned buildings in town was getting larger every time I went through the town. Of course, some of this is attributable to the decline of downtown business districts everywhere, a phenomenon that began shortly after World War II and accelerated in the 1950s with the "explosion" of suburban developments. That is when cities and towns everywhere began to grow outward and the downtown areas began to suffer as a result. However, many of these abandoned buildings, in Carlsbad, were not in the downtown area. But, be that as it may, the recent resurgence in Carlsbad is noticeable with the addition of new hotels, restaurants and other types of businesses. Most of the growth is on the southwest side of town, along National Parks Highway, the road to the caverns. This federal highway carries the dual designation of U.S. Highway 62&180. This highway provides access not only to Carlsbad Caverns National Park, but to
Guadalupe Mountains National Park, which is in Texas. Both parks are headquartered together in Carlsbad, on the south side of town.
  Although Carlsbad has had its share of ups and down in regards to population, it was never in really bad shape like many other towns in this area are. It did not lose 50% to 60% of its population like some other nearby towns did. The nearby caverns may be the reason for this. That tourism industry, in addition to federal employment with two national parks being in the area plus a national forest (Lincoln National Forest), plus a federal courthouse and office building, provided federal government jobs for the town. Lincoln National Forest has a ranger station in Carlsbad for the Guadalupe Ranger District.
  One thing that really sticks out in my mind about Carlsbad is the fact that traffic lights at a bunch of intersections have been taken down over the years. The first time I ever went through Carlsbad, in 1979, was when I was going to summer camp near Santa Fe. To the best of my knowledge, traffic lights at 14 intersections have been taken down in Carlsbad over the years. Some of these intersections are still extremely busy. I am not sure why, but that is one thing that always sticks in my mind about Carlsbad. If it was a dying city, I could understand this, but it is not a dying city. Of course, one intersection has received traffic lights in the past few years, that did not have them previously, two more intersections are about to receive them
(and they may be operational by now) and a few more intersections are being studied to determine of they need traffic lights.