New Mexico transportation laws

What it would do: Creates a rail infrastructure corporate income tax credit for railroads equal to 50% of qualified reconstruction, replacement, or new infrastructure expenditures, capped at $5,000 per mile of track or $1,000,000 per new customer project, with a $6,000,000 annual aggregate limit through 2035.

What it would do: Creates the railroad crossing safety program and fund as a nonreverting state treasury fund to finance projects improving safety at road and railroad intersections, and appropriates one million dollars from the general fund for fiscal year 2027 and subsequent years.

What it would do: Increases the gasoline tax from seventeen cents to twenty-three cents per gallon and the special fuel excise tax from twenty-one cents to twenty-six cents per gallon, effective July 1, 2026.

What it would do: Requires railroad corporations operating trains in New Mexico to install wayside detector systems with hot bearings and dragging equipment detectors at least every ten miles, report defects and system status annually to the department, and prohibits retaliation against crew members reporting safety violations, with administrative penalties up to $25,000 for violations.

What it would do: Prohibits state agencies, the environmental improvement board, local boards, and municipalities from adopting or enforcing rules that restrict, limit, or prohibit the delivery, sale, lease, use, or purchase of vehicles based on energy source, or that mandate percentages of vehicles by energy source.

What it would do: Establishes a maximum speed limit of 65 miles per hour for truck tractors on highways and sets a penalty assessment of $250 for violations of this speed limit.

What it would do: Prohibits the Environmental Improvement Board from promulgating or continuing any rule that requires manufacturers to produce or deliver for sale a certain percentage of zero-emission vehicles for a model year to control motor vehicle emissions.

What it would do: Establishes a weight allowance for heavy-duty electric vehicles by permitting electric vehicles with a gross vehicle weight rating of 26,001 pounds or more to exceed standard gross weight limits under New Mexico motor vehicle code.

What it would do: Establishes a special permit review board within the department of transportation to review applications for continued eligibility to receive special permits. Creates a misdemeanor for operating an overweight vehicle in violation of time restrictions in a special permit, with penalty assessments of $1,000 for first violation and $2,000 for second violation.

What it would do: Enacts the Autonomous Vehicle Act requiring a human operator physically present behind the wheel of autonomous vehicles until 2036, establishes safety and testing requirements, prohibits autonomous commercial vehicle operation except for testing, mandates incident reporting, creates a commercial driver's license endorsement for autonomous vehicles, and increases insurance requirements.

What it would do: Establishes requirements for motor carriers of railroad employees, including driver training, background checks, liability insurance of at least $5,000,000, vehicle equipment standards, hours of service limits, and drug and alcohol testing programs. Applies existing Motor Carrier Safety Act provisions to these carriers and expands safety belt requirements to all motor carriers.

What it would do: Creates a rail infrastructure corporate income tax credit for railroads equal to 50% of qualified reconstruction, replacement, or new infrastructure expenditures, capped at $5,000 per mile of track owned or leased or $1,000,000 per new customer project, with a maximum annual aggregate of $6,000,000 certified by the Department of Transportation for taxable years before January 1, 2036.

What it would do: Amends motor vehicle excise tax distributions to allocate ten percent to the general fund, sixty-five percent to the state road fund, and twenty-five percent to the transportation project fund, effective July 1, 2026.

What it would do: Amends the clean transportation fuel standard program by prohibiting transportation fuels from being assigned a carbon intensity value of less than zero.