Herbicides are an important tool in NMDOT’s vegetation management toolbox, particularly for controlling certain noxious weeds and other vegetation that cannot be effectively managed through mechanical methods alone. At the same time, NMDOT recognizes that herbicides can pose risks to human health and the environment if used improperly or unnecessarily. That is why our IVM program is focused on using herbicides only when needed, making herbicide use more targeted, more selective, and more effective.
NMDOT is conducting a comprehensive review of herbicide practices across the Department to identify opportunities to sharply reduce or eliminate herbicide use where other effective management options are available. NMDOT is also evaluating the relative toxicity and environmental effects of the products it uses and will seek lower-risk alternatives where they can provide comparable effectiveness.
Ultimately, the IVM program aims to manage healthier roadside vegetation in ways that reduce the need for chemical intervention in the first place.

Pollinators including bees, butterflies, moths, hummingbirds, bats, beetles, and other animals are essential to New Mexico’s ecosystems and agricultural systems.

NMDOT is committed to protecting and expanding pollinator habitat across the more than 200,000 acres of right-of-way that we manage. This includes protecting existing native vegetation, reducing unnecessary mowing and disturbance, allowing native plants to flower and produce seed, and actively restoring pollinator habitat where appropriate.

Our work with the University of New Mexico’s Wild Friends program helped make New Mexico’s Pollinator Protection License Plate possible. Wild Friends students researched pollinators, developed the concept, and worked with the New Mexico Legislature to establish the specialty plate. Proceeds support NMDOT pollinator-protection activities, including planting native flowers and grasses along state roads and creating pollinator-friendly demonstration gardens at rest areas.

NMDOT is grateful to the Wild Friends students and community members who helped turn this idea into a statewide conservation program.

Vegetation management plays an important role in controlling erosion, dust, and stormwater along New Mexico’s roadways.
Bare soil is vulnerable to wind and water erosion, which can generate dust, increase sediment runoff, damage infrastructure, and create additional maintenance needs. Healthy vegetation helps stabilize soil, reduce erosion, slow stormwater runoff, and improve water infiltration.
For this reason, IVM is closely tied to NMDOT’s revegetation, erosion control, dust mitigation, and stormwater management efforts. NMDOT’s stormwater program uses vegetation to help filter pollutants and manage runoff, while revegetation and dust-mitigation efforts use vegetation to stabilize disturbed soils. Healthy roadside vegetation is more than an aesthetic benefit. It is part of the infrastructure that protects soil, manages water, and reduces pollution.

NMDOT has developed statewide vegetation management mapping across its maintained roadsides. This information documents current management practices and provides a foundation for evaluating their effectiveness.

NMDOT also maintains information about roadside management activities to identify opportunities for monitoring. By comparing management practices with observed vegetation conditions over time, we can learn which approaches work best under different circumstances. What works in a high-desert grassland may not work in a piñon-juniper landscape, an irrigated urban corridor, or a riparian environment. IVM allows management decisions to reflect those differences.