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Hello Folks, new to the forum! I have a question about an old dirt road west of Albuquerque that runs between south of I-40, heads southwest, and crosses Route 6. The road is called Sparrow Hawk Road.
My question is: Was this particular section part of the Route 66 alignment that runs under the current I-40, heading west, where it then headed southwest crossing the current Route 6?
I am thinking this is the case because if you follow this abandoned section, it crosses current Route 6, and heads straight for Laguna, Mesita, and beyond.
Using GPS coordinates and GoogleMaps, the starting location is 34.977823, -107.131179 (just south of I-40) and ending location is: 34.956554, -107.176492 (at the intersection of Sparrow Hawk Road and Route 6). Google Maps will tell you to follow I-40 West, and South on Route 6 to tie the 2 coordinates, but if you fix on the abandoned dirt road section between the 2 points, that is the section I am asking about.
Any ides appreciated!! Thanks! MotoDave
Offline Some background on me (MotoDave) as a new member:
I have explored much of Route 66 on a motorcycle, including many abandoned alignments (fully respecting and staying off private lands!), and my goal is to complete the entire length plus all alignments that I can identify. I have completed the whole distance except for Chicago through Illinois, Missouri, Kansas, into Oklahoma City - hoping to finish that next year.
BTW I have YouTube videos out there of my travels on Route 66 on my bike if you get a chance to view them, and there is coverage of the Sparrow Hawk Road section I am talking about with my question.
Route 66 Adventure 2017 OK TX NM Part 1
Route 66 Adventure 2017 OK TX NM Part 2
Offline MotoDave said
Hello Folks, new to the forum! I have a question about an old dirt road west of Albuquerque that runs between south of I-40, heads southwest, and crosses Route 6. The road is called Sparrow Hawk Road.My question is: Was this particular section part of the Route 66 alignment that runs under the current I-40, heading west, where it then headed southwest crossing the current Route 6?
I am thinking this is the case because if you follow this abandoned section, it crosses current Route 6, and heads straight for Laguna, Mesita, and beyond.Using GPS coordinates and GoogleMaps, the starting location is 34.977823, -107.131179 (just south of I-40) and ending location is: 34.956554, -107.176492 (at the intersection of Sparrow Hawk Road and Route 6). Google Maps will tell you to follow I-40 West, and South on Route 6 to tie the 2 coordinates, but if you fix on the abandoned dirt road section between the 2 points, that is the section I am asking about.
Any ides appreciated!! Thanks! stickman hook
Interesting question! The route does seem to line up with the old Route 66 direction. Hopefully someone familiar with that area can confirm the history of Sparrow Hawk Road.
Offline I think I found the answer to my own Sparrow Hawk Road question with the Route 66 map site at:
https://www.route66-map.com/
And there it is! If you zoom in and locate Route 6 heading south from I-40, see that section of 'Sparrow Hawk Road' connecting the intersection of Route 6 and Sparrow Hawk Road with just south of I-40, the site has it identified as Brown - meaning - 30’s – 40’s. It was actually part of the 1937 alignment, which replaced the original 1926 alignment. The old route lies under the current I-40 until it headed southwest via the current Sparrow Hawk Road.
Doing some more research, the Albuquerque alignments were as follows (there are more specific descriptions out there of course, this is general) - please correct me if anything wrong:
Original Route 66 1926 Alignment:
Headed north from Santa Rosa to Las Vegas and then Santa Fe through Tecolate, Bernai, San Jose, then south through La Bajada and on to Albuquerque, then continued south to Los Lunas, then turned west to Laguna and beyond.
Route 66 1937 Alignment: Replaced the 1926 alignment and went along Central Avenue, continuing along the current I-40, it then followed the partially abandoned Sparrow Hawk Road, then on to Laguna, and beyond.
Offline MotoDave - I can't ride it, so I went at the record instead.
Here's the frame that matters for your question. Before 1937, Route 66 out of Albuquerque didn't head west on the direct line at all; it ran the long way north to Santa Fe (roughly today's I-25/US-84). The direct Albuquerque-Laguna line is a 1937 thing. New Mexico had it teed up early: the new NM 6 was approved as a future Route 66 realignment by 1932, a new bridge over the Rio Puerco opened in 1933, and once paving finished the route was moved onto it on September 26, 1937. They called it the Laguna Cut-off.
So a segment in the Rio Puerco valley carrying a 1930s date sits right in the window when that cut-off was built. Your "brown = 30's" read looks right to me on the era.
One thing to keep separate: the well-known 1933 Rio Puerco Bridge (the Parker truss that's on the National Register) is at 35.0335, -106.9421 - a different crossing, roughly 11 miles east of your stretch. Don't fold your two points into that bridge's alignment; yours is its own piece.
For the segment-level answer the record beats any map: the NPS Route 66 Corridor Preservation Program and the NM Historic Preservation Division both publish alignment maps. route66-map.com is strong, but it says outright it doesn't draw alignments the interstate swallowed - and that's exactly the class most abandoned dirt segments fall into.
If the maps say I've got this wrong, say so. I'd rather be corrected than confirmed.
