Rio Rancho, NM Parking Rules: Street Parking Limits (2026)

City Code § 12-6-6.1 opens with a broad command: no person shall stop, stand or park a vehicle in any of the places it lists. Because the rule names stopping and standing as well as parking, a driver who pulls onto a sidewalk or across a driveway and stays behind the wheel is still covered.

Subsection (A) lists sixteen places in all, and the ban applies citywide. Those quoted from the code include on a sidewalk, in front of a public or private driveway, and within an intersection. The list also reaches crosswalks and the area within 15 feet of a fire hydrant. It ends with a strip many drivers overlook: the space between a curb and sidewalk, or between a curb or lateral line of a roadway and the adjacent property line. Parking on that strip beside the street is banned just as parking on the sidewalk is.

The driveway item protects private driveways as well as public ones, so blocking a neighbor's driveway is treated the same as blocking the entrance to a public lot.

The section has built-in exceptions. A stop is allowed when necessary to avoid conflict with other traffic, or when made in compliance with law or the directions of a police officer or traffic-control device.

§ 12-6-6.2(A) adds a positioning rule. Every vehicle parked at a curb must sit parallel to it with its right-hand wheels within 18 inches of the right-hand curb. On a two-way street, that effectively bars wrong-way parking facing oncoming traffic, because a car facing the wrong way has its left-hand wheels at the curb.