D e s e r t E x p o s u r e
June 2010
Potty Breakdown
Closing highway rest stops could leave travelers with
no place to go.
The Butterfield rest area between Silver City and Deming is once again in state budget-cutters' crosshairs. The rest stop, whose potential closing several years ago was one of the first topics we covered in Desert Exposure (May 2003), is on a statewide list of facilities the highway department might flush to save money. The "roadrunner" rest stop on I-10 just west of Las Cruces is also on the endangered potty-break list.
 |
In perhaps deciding that highway travelers really don't need to heed the call of nature — that's why God invented trees, after all — New Mexico is just catching up with our neighbor to the west. Last October, Arizona "temporarily" shuttered 13 of its 18 highway rest stops, including the San Simon facility on I-10 not far from the New Mexico border. Cannily, Arizona officials no doubt reasoned that eastbound bladder-beset drivers would simply grit their teeth and continue to the rest stop near Lordsburg, straining New Mexico's septic systems and highway budget instead. After a few trips, westbound travelers would learn the hard way to stop in New Mexico before trekking across Arizona, where the first open I-10 rest stop is now at Texas Canyon, 103 long, legs-crossed miles west of Lordsburg.
We can almost see the argument that the rest stop with the giant roadrunner sculpture is superfluous, given the proximity of gas stations and eateries just down the highway in Las Cruces. It would be a shame, though, to deprive road-weary drivers of that lovely view of the Mesilla Valley and the Organ Mountains beyond, not to mention the opportunity to admire Olin Calk's recycled-metal roadrunner creation (see "Big Bird," May 2005) up close. Where else are folks going to see such a thing, anyway? Besides, it's good public policy to make travelers associate the lovable roadrunner — who hasn't seen the Warner Bros. cartoons? — with New Mexico. Unlike Roswell's space aliens, we actually have roadrunners.
Closing the Butterfield rest stop between Silver City and Deming is more problematic. As anyone who's driven that chunk of Hwy. 180 knows all too well, there's not a heck of a lot between those two towns. With no offense intended to the perfectly lovely antelopes one sometimes spots along the highway, or the occasional grazing cattle, it's a mighty lonely stretch. Driving northwest from Deming, there's a whole lot of nothing until you hit the Hurley truck stop — almost 40 miles. And if you're heading down to Deming and forget to do your business — or maybe just didn't hear the call of nature loudly enough — until Bayard and Hurley are well in your rearview mirror, Deming just can't come soon enough. And it won't.
We can see this being a bonanza for that truck stop in Hurley, sure, although customers racing to the restroom aren't exactly the sort of target market most places aim for. Few if any business plans read, "Our primary market will be people who have to pee so badly that their eyes are watering. Once these customers have found sweet, blessed relief in our overtaxed restrooms, they will likewise empty their wallets by purchasing our coffee, pie and peanut brittle."
It would be interesting, in fact, to see the economic impact of Arizona's rest area shutdowns on the handful of waystations between the border and Willcox, the first real town of any size one comes to heading west. There's a little place at the Bowie exit that we've never stopped at. (Since the San Simon closing, our bladders have been rigorously trained to "hold it" from Lordsburg to Willcox.) Maybe it's experiencing an unprecedented boom — the local equivalent of federal economic-stimulus cash. Heck, might be we could get the whole economy back on its feet just by closing enough rest areas!
More likely, though, yellow-eyed travelers have other things on their minds — well, one other thing — than shopping for bobble-head dolls or sampling the chicken-fried steak. That Bowie place's restroom-maintenance costs have no doubt skyrocketed — out of toilet paper again?! — while its business may have increased (dare we say it?) only a trickle.
In any case, closing rest-area facilities seems a peculiar priority for budget cutting. Has something changed in human physiology that no one's told us about? Has some newfangled technology (the Wii — pronounced "wee" — perhaps?), er, eliminated the call of nature in our species? (Or maybe it's that iPad we keeping reading about, which would explain the funny name.)
Sure, our pioneer ancestors forged a path across the landscape without the benefit of sissified highway rest stops. You didn't hear people heading west in the Gold Rush whining about the lack of flush toilets, non-potable water and chained-up vending machines. You think Daniel Boone took potty breaks on his way to the Cumberland Gap? There was no toilet paper on the frontier! (Which might, however, help explain that omnipresent coonskin cap.) The Santa Fe Trail was not dotted with signs reading, "Next Rest Area 57 Miles." Kids who squealed "Are we there yet?" every couple miles soon got left for the coyotes.
Indeed, I can't recall a single episode of "Wagon Train" — one of my favorite shows growing up — in which "gruff, but good-at-heart Major Seth Adams, backed up by his competent frontier scout, Flint McCullough" (as the IMDB website recalls our heroes) even paused to let weary passengers utilize the nearest tree or patch of sagebrush. No, the men and women who won the West had bladders of iron!
And forget about other amenities. You need a drinking fountain, o pioneers? Flint McCullough (played by the steely-eyed Robert Horton) would point you to the nearest watering hole — don't mind the skulls of dead cattle that sipped there before you. How about a vending machine to buy a Salted Nut Roll? Just eat your beef jerky and pemmican and pipe down. Don't even bother looking for a pet exercise area — after all, "Cookie" fed your dog to the rest of the wagon train a hundred dusty miles back. (Is that really "beef" jerky, come to think of it?) A helpful highway map, perhaps adorned with some local lore? The last map the wagon train consulted had Utah where Nevada's supposed to be, and was dotted with skull-and-crossbones symbols where settlers had been slaughtered.
So, yes, maybe we've grown soft and spoiled. Unlike our pioneer forebears, we expect our tax dollars to provide periodic bathroom breaks. We've likewise gotten unaccustomed to occasional raids by the folks who were here before us, and we've come to expect free wi-fi access even in the middle of nowhere.
These endangered rest areas are not exactly palaces for the pampered, however. Did we mention nonpotable water in the sinks? The Salted Nut Rolls, quite frankly, are often stale. Just try to get a Cherry Coke instead of the regular kind. And the now-closed San Simon rest stop actually had a sign warning travelers not to wander around because of the danger of rattlesnakes.
That's right, Flint McCullough — rattlers! Not so tough now, are ya? And you could break a tooth on those Salted Nut Rolls, too.
Still, both Arizona and New Mexico may need to change their marketing a tad to prepare visitors for the hardships of highways with rest stops now few and far between. "Arizona — where it's not just the heat that's dry" might be a subtle way of reminding folks that there's no rest for the weary there. New Mexico, if it also shutters rest stops deemed nonessential, might need to swap "Land of Enchantment" for "Land of Crossed Legs" or "Land of Urinary-Tract Infections." Maybe we could work a deal with Wisconsin to sell cranberry juice. (We're not sure about the status of rest stops over in Texas, but closures there could give new meaning to the phrase, "Texas hold 'em.")
Those tourism geniuses in Santa Fe — you know, the guys who gave us the Roswell-alien Rose Bowl float — could even make a virtue of our new necessity. "Are you tough enough to travel across New Mexico?" could be the new advertising slogan, with the kicker, "Or are you yellow?"
Desert Exposure editor David A. Fryxell always puts the seat down.