The New Mexico Highlands region of north-central New Mexico sits at an ecological crossroads. Located at the southern end of the Rocky Mountains, the western edge of the Great Plains, the northern end of the Sierra Madre Occidental, the northern part of the Chihuahuan Desert, and the southeastern edge of the Great Basin, the region contains an extraordinary diversity of terrain, climates, habitats, and species. This great biological and geographic variety encompasses cacti and reptiles inhabiting dry desert floors, fish and migratory birds moving along cottonwood-lined rivers, and black bear and mountain lion roaming pine-clad mountain ranges.

The region's natural legacy has been severely compromised, however, by destructive forestry and livestock grazing, development, pollution, and disruption of natural processes. Collectively, these human impacts to the land have degraded ecosystems and fragmented wildlife habitats. While some scientists and policy-makers recognize these threats, strategies to restore and protect biological diversity have not yet been implemented at a scale that comprehensively addresses these threats.

The Wildlands Network Design sets out that agenda for renewal a proposed New Mexico Highlands Wildlands Network comprised of core wild areas, compatible-use lands, and wildlife linkages designed to restore and protect the region's natural heritage. The primary goals of the network are to conserve the region's natural communities, sustain healthy populations of native wildlife that depend upon those habitats, and restore key natural processes across the landscape.

To begin the implementation process for this conservation plan, the Wildlands Project and its regional partners, including the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance and the Tijeras Canyon Safe Passage Coalition, are advocating for both expanded and new wilderness areas and also for protection of critical wildlife linkages.