UNM’s Physics & Astronomy Interdisciplinary Science Facility
Albuquerque has some very important visitors today. And although the visit by representatives of the U.S. Air Force and Space Force is unfortunately limited to a virtual tour due to the pandemic, the visit has the potential of changing the landscape of the Duke City and New Mexico for the better for a hundred years or more.
Albuquerque is on the short list of six cities being considered to permanently host the new headquarters for U.S. Space Command. And the stakes are high.
The new Space Command is expected to bring more than a thousand civilian and military jobs to the selected city, with potentially billions of dollars of economic activity for the region and untold private-sector contracts. Space Command is now temporarily at Peterson Air Force Base in Colorado Springs. In addition to Peterson AFB and our own Kirtland Air Force Base, the other contenders are Air Force bases in Florida, Nebraska, Alabama and Texas. A