By BEN THEOBALD
Daily Press Staff Writer
A public hearing was held Thursday at the Central Valley Electric Cooperative to discuss proposed plans for improving U.S. Highway 82 between Artesia and Lovington.
The meeting was the first of a series of meetings to discuss the proposed U.S. 82 Roadway Project the New Mexico Department of Transportation (DOT) has begun planning to improve safety conditions on the highway. The limits of the project run from milepost 107.7, East Seventh Street in Artesia, to milepost 170.7, South Ninth Street in Lovington.
“This project goes all the way from Artesia starting at East Seventh Street, which is right where the existing four-lane just east of the railroad tracks transitions into two lanes, and it continues east through the community of Riverside through Loco Hills past New Mexico 529, through Maljamar into Lovington,” said David L. Pennington, vice president and area manager of Parsons Brinckerhoff, a contractor conducting the alignment study. “It ends right around Ninth Street in Lovington. That is a 63-mile lane. That is the limits of our study.”
According to a presentation given by Pennington at the public hearing, from 2010 to 2013, there have been 163 reported crashes on the highway involving 47 injuries and six fatalities. …
