Sandia Cave Improvements Project

Sandia Cave National Historic Landmark is a horizontal solution cavity located high on the east side of Las Huertas Canyon in the northern Sandia Mountains, just east of Albuquerque, New Mexico. The cave is a National Historic Landmark (NHL), a site listed on the National and New Mexico State Register of Historic Places, a designated Significant Cave, and a Traditional Cultural Property. The cave displays evidence of sporadic but continuous use for the past 10,000 years and continues to be a place of cultural and spiritual significance to several Pueblo communities in New Mexico. Because it is an easily accessible cave with historic, cultural, recreational, educational, geological, and biological value, Sandia Cave NHL has become a popular site for recreationalists and school/university environmental education groups on the Cibola National Forest.  

Facilities to access the cave were constructed in the late 1970s and include a parking area and maintained trail. Trail features include two concrete stairways with steel-pipe handrails and a grated-steel spiral staircase at the entrance to the cave. Since initial development of the site, facilities have largely not been updated, although there has been an effort to repair portions of the trail tread. The spiral staircase and the concrete stairways are deteriorating and the rock retaining wall supporting the concrete stairs is being undermined by erosion. The parking area is inadequate for the site and collects large pools of water during the monsoon season. The site also lacks informational signage about the cultural, historical and ecological significance of the cave. The lack of information coupled with its relatively remote location that is difficult to access by Forest Service staff, has likely contributed to the frequent occurrences of vandalism and graffiti. 

The integrity of Sandia Cave diminished extensively throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. Prior to a massive restoration effort in the summer of 2015, the first two chambers of the cave and the metal infrastructure by which the cave is accessed were heavily and repeatedly vandalized with spray paint, marker, nail polish, and etching. The cave walls were severely sooted and blackened by fires lit in its interior, and large amounts of graffiti and litter appeared along the trail from the parking area.  The restoration project, however, was very successful in both removing graffiti from the cave and in deterring new graffiti. 

On June 2, 2025, the Cibola initiated the NEPA process with the start of the scoping period.

We value your input. Substantive comments are the most useful; they are comments that are within the scope of the proposed action, are specific to the proposed action, have a direct relationship to the proposed action and include supporting reasons for consideration.

Please submit your comments no later than June 30, 2025.

Written Comments must be submitted to:
District Ranger, Ken Born 
ATTN: Sandia Cave Improvements Project 
Sandia Ranger District 
11776 Highway 337 
Tijeras, NM 87059

Electric Comments must be submitted to sm.fs.r3cibolamail@usda.gov, Subject Line: Sandia Cave Improvements Project.

To provide Oral Comments, please call the Sandia Ranger District Office at (505) 281-3304. Oral comments must be provided during regular business hours, between 8:30 am and 4:30 pm, Monday through Friday.

Click Here to view the scoping letter, map, and 30% project design. Click Here to visit the NEPA webpage. 

A print copy of the proposal will be available to view during regular business hours (8:30am-4:30pm, Monday-Friday) at the front desk of the Sandia Ranger District Office, 11776 Highway 337 Tijeras, NM 87059.