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Carlsbad, New Mexico: An Updated Comprehensive Plan - Fall 2001

The purpose of this plan is to guide Greater Carlsbad’s elected and appointed officials as they lead Eddy County’s largest community into the 21st century. It is a time when Carlsbad faces many challenges, some of them resulting from change in the national, and now global, economy, others resulting from actions taken and not taken by Carlsbad in the past. The community has many of the resources it needs to meet these challenges successfully.

This document is Carlsbad’s first update of its Comprehensive Plan since 1973. More than a quarter of a century has passed. Nevertheless, this plan shares basic concepts with the community’s earlier planning efforts.

Site Profile

Carlsbad, NM is located in Eddy County, in southeast New Mexico, on the northern edge of the Chihuahuan Desert. It is the gateway community to the Carlsbad Caverns National Park, an outstanding profusion of diverse mineral formations that occur in a network of more than 80 limestone caves and to the Waste Isolation Pilot Plant, the nation’s first facility to permanently dispose of transuranic waste in deep underground vaults.

Carlsbad began in the late 19th century as a farming and ranching community. It is home to the Carlsbad Irrigation District, the successor of the Bureau of Reclamation’s second project to “reclaim” the great American desert for agriculture.

Carlsbad is home to over 25,000 residents, and many more farmers, ranchers, roughnecks, scientists, engineers, and miners who work in the industries and businesses that surround it in Eddy County visit daily to patronize its businesses, its schools, and its amenities.

Basic Planning Concepts

The plan is general in nature; it does not detail regulatory measures but provides local governments with general policy guidelines and principles.
The plan is long range; it considers development trends and progress potential over the next two decades until the year 2020.
The plan is comprehensive: it encompasses the entire City of Carlsbad and the nine townships that surround it.
The plan provides a vision for the future based on assumptions and forecasts about what that future might look like.

Plan Participation

Dozens of Carlsbad and Eddy County residents have been involved in the preparation of this plan over the last two years, including elected and appointed officials from both local governments.

Plan Elements

The plan consists of several elements: Land Use, Transportation, Community Facilities, Community Services, Housing, and Riverfront Development. Although it does not address economic development directly, it is based on Carlsbad’s recent economic development planning sponsored in part by the Department of Energy, and many of the plan’s policies are written with an eye towards achieving economic development success.

Planning Themes

City-county cooperation in overseeing the quality of development in unincorporated areas adjacent to Carlsbad.
Enhancing the visual quality of Carlsbad’s built environment.
Renewing transportation planning efforts in order to support economic development efforts.
Providing residents and visitors with high quality public services and facilities.