Los Lunas receives grant to design a Route 66 museum
LOS LUNAS — A partnership between the village of Los Lunas and the University of New Mexico School of Architecture and Planning has been awarded a $25,000 grant by the National Endowment for the Arts to support design and planning of a Los Lunas Route 66 Museum and Visitors Center.
Last month NEA Chairman Jane Chu announced 60 awards totaling $4.1 million supporting projects across the nation through the Our Town grant program.
The village will be working with several professors at the UNM School of Architecture and Planning to offer studio courses focused on the museum project.
“It’s an honor and a privilege to be awarded this grant,” said Los Lunas Mayor Charles Griego. “We’re excited to partner with the UNM School of Architecture and Planning to develop the design concept and look forward to engaging village residents and businesses in the effort.”
The Route 66 Museum has been in the village’s plans for several years to commemorate when the route dipped down into Los Lunas between 1926 and 1937 before heading west to California.
“The focus of our Route 66 Museum is really to tell the under-told stories of local, mostly Hispanic agricultural communities and how the route impacted them,” said Erin Callahan, the village’s special projects planner.
The village purchased the lot and two structures west of the Luna Mansion with the Route 66 project in mind. One of the structures is a historic building and likely where the museum will be housed, Callahan said.
The property was the old Country Inn and part of what the grant will fund is a historic preservation inventory, as well as intensive studio courses through the UNM School of Architecture.
“So we’re excited for them to see what needs to be done to that structure to preserve it and then let us adaptively re-use it for a museum,” Callahan said.
In the spring of
2019, four different studio courses will be coordinated through the UNM School of Architecture and Planning, including master planning for the site, some asset mapping to see what is in close proximity of the site and how a museum would best function in the area.
The historic inventory course will analyze the structure with some class work done in the summer of 2019, and then in the fall, an advanced architecture design course will draft the museum and museum grounds architectural design.
“We don’t expect to finish 2019 with a set of stamped construction drawings to take to build,” said Callahan. “What we expect to come out of the year with is some really great designs that then we can put out to bid for an RFP.”
The hope is that by spring of 2020 the village will be in a position to put out an RFP for construction.
The village was one of 60 NEA Our Town projects selected nationwide for the grant, and UNM’s School of Architecture and Planning is excited to collaborate with the village.
In a press release, Tim B. Castillo, associate dean of the School of Architecture and Planning, said they have a legacy of working with many communities in New Mexico, and the faculty and students are excited at the opportunity to work with the community of Los Lunas to design and plan for the Route 66 Museum and Visitors Center.
“We feel this collaboration is a great opportunity for students to work on a real world planning and design project in partnership with a local municipality,” added Moises Gonzales, professor of Community and Regional Planning.