Historic Old Town in Albuquerque, NM

Historic Old Town is the original town site of Albuquerque, established in 1706 under New Mexico governor Francisco Cuervo y Valdés and listed on the state register as the Old Albuquerque Historic District. It sits west of Downtown, roughly bounded by Mountain Road, 19th Street, Central Avenue and Rio Grande Boulevard, with about ten blocks of adobe buildings ringing Old Town Plaza. San Felipe de Neri Church, finished in 1793, anchors the north side of the square. Shops, galleries and restaurants fill much of the ground floor around the plaza, houses stand on the blocks behind them, and the city programs events on the square through the year.

Most of the buildings around the plaza went up between 1870 and 1900: one and two stories, adobe walls, arranged in the Spanish colonial pattern of a square with the church on one side. The district carries special historic zoning from the city on top of its state register listing, so what happens to those facades is reviewed rather than left to the owner.

There is no homeowners association. The Historic Old Town Association speaks for the area, and the city lists it among its recognized neighborhood associations; a separate West Old Town Neighborhood Association is registered as well, which is worth knowing when a question turns out to belong to the blocks next door.

The Arts and Culture Department handles the plaza itself, running the city's birthday celebration, Balloon Fiesta week programming and the Old Town Holiday Stroll, and renting out the Old Town Gazebo. Plaza Don Luis holds the city's largest Christmas tree, and the Old Town Portal Market operates on the square. The Albuquerque Museum, Explora and the New Mexico Museum of Natural History and Science are a short walk northeast, which puts a good deal of foot traffic on the surrounding streets on weekends.