The New York Times > National > In Dying Desert Town, Residents Eagerly Await 'Terror Attacks'
Who says government is wasteful? Seems that Homeland Security has found a use for a ghost town--a planned community from the 1970s that has only about 50 people left in it. It will be a place to simulate terrorist attacks and how to respond to them.

PLAYAS, N.M., Sept. 20 - The Phelps Dodge mining company pictured a suburban utopia with a Southwestern flavor when it built this town for its employees from scratch in the early 1970's. It incorporated a six-lane bowling alley, a rodeo ring, a helicopter pad, a shooting range and a swimming pool into the community of 259 ranch-style homes.But the company shut its nearby copper smelter because of sluggish prices in the late 1990's. And these days, more animals than people can be found wandering the streets.
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So the residents of Playas, all 50 or so of those remaining from the peak of 1,000, say they are more than ready for their town to become a target for pickups laden with explosives and simulations of suicide bombs, water-supply poisoning and anthrax attacks. In what might be the beginning of Playas's renaissance, the Department of Homeland Security is channeling $5 million to a small New Mexico engineering school to buy the entire town. The school, in turn, aims to turn the town into one of the country's top locations for antiterrorism training.
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