177 years in pictures
6 postcards, papers and photographs from public archives, and 11 places on the National Register.
- 1849Las Cruces is settled
- 1898Advert for WIA program in Las Cruces, 30 September 1898
- 1918Aerial view of Las Cruces, New Mexico
A city of 114,197, settled in 1849. Nearly 34% of it is conserved land.
The 3 things Las Cruces does most differently from other towns.
6 postcards, papers and photographs from public archives, and 11 places on the National Register.
3 colleges in town.
Be the first to start the conversation.
Nothing on the calendar.
Ordered by what stands out in Las Cruces. Another town gets a different order.
117 miles of trails across 58 parks and preserves.
| Biggest places to walk | Trails | Acres |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Sonoma Ranch Golf Course | 4.9 mi | 170 |
| 2. Young Park | 1.6 mi | 21 |
| 3. Veteran's Park | 0.6 mi | 10 |
The public schools Las Cruces’s kids attend, from kindergarten through graduation, outperform 87% of New Mexico’s districts on state tests and graduation. Among towns with similar incomes, they rank near the top.
| School | Grades | Students | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|
| Monte Vista Elementary | PK–5 | 706 | Not graded |
| Highland Elementary | PK–5 | 704 | Not graded |
| Sonoma Elementary | PK–5 | 660 | Not graded |
| Desert Hills Elementary | PK–5 | 502 | Not graded |
| Cesar Chavez Elementary | PK–2 | 492 | Not graded |
| Loma Heights Elementary | PK–5 | 450 | Not graded |
The typical Las Cruces home is worth about $290,000, down 0.7% in a year, 9% below the New Mexico typical home.
Las Cruces reports more crime per resident than most U.S. towns we grade: about 96% report less.
Las Cruces beats the New Mexico average on 1 of 32 CDC measures and trails it on 0.
| What stands out | Las Cruces | NM |
|---|---|---|
| Fewer adults who have had cancer | 6.7% | 7.4% |
60% of Las Cruces’s working residents work right in town. The top destinations are University Park (6%), El Paso (5%) and Albuquerque (4%). Half commute less than 4 miles.
Las Cruces has mild winters and hot summers, with very little rain. A typical July afternoon reaches 96°, a January night drops to 28°, and about 1 inches of snow falls in a normal winter.
Expected storm and flood damage is higher than in 39% of U.S. communities.
97,618 people in 2010; 114,197 today.
U.S. Census 2010 & 2020 · ACS
11 places in Las Cruces on the National Register of Historic Places.
38 notable people were born in Las Cruces.






City in New Mexico, United States
Las Cruces (; Spanish: [las 'kruses]; lit. 'the crosses') is a city in Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States, and its county seat. The population was 111,385 at the 2020 census, making it the second-most populous city in New Mexico, and the largest in both Doña Ana County and southern New Mexico. It is the principal city of the Las Cruces metropolitan statistical area, which encompasses all of Doña Ana County and had an estimated 230,000 residents in 2024. The city is also part of the larger El Paso–Las Cruces combined statistical area. Las Cruces is the economic and geographic center of the Mesilla Valley, the agricultural region on the floodplain of the Rio Grande, which extends from…
From Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0 · facts via Wikidata (CC0)
3 towns share a border with Las Cruces.