Albuquerque’s Route 66 Motels Are Turning Into Affordable Housing

Albuquerque’s Route 66 Motels Are Turning Into Affordable Housing

Albuquerque’s Route 66 Motels Are Turning Into Affordable Housing As a housing crisis pummels the American West, from Sun Valley, Idaho, to Tucson, Arizona, there’s a dull irony in the number of abandoned houses and old hotels. Some of them cluster around former mining boomtowns; Bannack, Montana, for instance, was briefly the state’s capital before the veins of gold ran dry and the 10,000 residents moved on. Today, some 60 buildings still stand, including the handsome red-brick Hotel Meade. Two Guns, Arizona, once served Dust Bowl migrants and other travelers along Route 66, but when the interstate highway passed it by, the town collapsed. Today, its ruins include homes and motels as well as campgrounds for travelers and the remnants of a zoo that once housed mountain lions and Gila monsters. An abandoned service station in Two Guns, Arizona. Credit: Mark Hughes / Flickr These “ghost houses” aren’t just found in old mining camps in the desert or mountains; they’re also in busy Western c…