It’s estimated that almost $20 million in building projects have been started or will be started within a year in Tucumcari, said a city planning official.
Two truck stop-plazas are already planned at exit 333 and I-40, and three motels are either under construction or being planned at the 334 and 332 exits at I-40, said Tucumcari Project Coordinator and Zoning Administrator Yvette Fazekas.
“With the motels, the two truck stops and the two government offices, we’re going to be covered in sites for a year,” she said. As well as adding to the city’s tax base, Fazekas said, “it should bring growth towards the city.”
The new development should help existing and new businesses develop from I-40 along Route 66 and from I-40 along First Street toward the city’s downtown area.
Also, as the First Street road improvement project comes to a close, there will be additional jobs from the new construction projects and then eventual full-time jobs in the hotels, she said.
The latest project to receive city approval is a four-story Sleep Inn and Suites at 3507 Tucumcari Blvd., said Fazekas who signed off on the project on Aug. 30. The Sleep Inn will be almost across the street from the Holiday Inn.
Although the project still has to be approved by the state, it’s planned to have 66 rooms on a 1.07 acre site, according to plans filed by Danny Patel for Roshan Lodging Inc.
The estimated construction cost of the Sleep Inn is $2.86 million, according to the plans.
Another hotel project is a 66-room La Quinta Inn and Suites that is up for preliminary review, Fazekas said.
It will have three stories and be built at 2516 South Adams, across the street from the McDonald’s restaurant and on the same side of the street as Trigg Memorial Hospital, she said. The general contractor for the project, owned by the Allied Hotel Group, LLC, is Nitin Bhakta of Tucumcari.
Already under construction is an 81-room Holiday Inn Express which is slated to open in Spring 2007. Bhakta is also involved in the development of that project.
Last month, Love’s truck stops announced it will undergo a major expansion at its current location and build a new $4.5 million truck stop at it Mountain Road site and I-40.
And the Flying J announced it would build a truck plaza that would cost between $4 and 6 million on Mountain Road, across the street from Love’s.