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Stafford listed four alternatives he said should be completed before the loop: widening Interstate 12; widening U.S. 190; making La. 447 a four-lane highway to Port Vincent; and building a new bridge over the Amite River near Watson.
Each of those alternatives, if completed together, would drastically improve traffic, reducing the need for the loop..."
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Good luck with that. All of those projects will have to be funded with federal and state highway money. Get in line with the other $14 BILLION + in projects, including bridge maintenance, that needs to come now, too. The loop, however, will be funded by future tolls and will cost taxpayers almost nothing and won't have to get into the pool of $14 billion in backlogged projects. It's something that can and will be done now.
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“We have one position that we will maintain,” Stafford said. “If one person has to unwillingly leave his house, we are opposed to (the loop).”
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That's the quote from someone that I expect would fight the loop tooth and nail and if it got thrown out would yell at city leaders that they need to fix the traffic problem, as long as it doesn't raise taxes or take more than a year to do.
Seriously, it would be utterly amazing if a 90-100 mile, 400 foot wide ribbon around the city wouldn't impact anyone's house or property. It will, and I expect it will cause fights and raise the issue up in discussion. Discussion about transportation in this city and surrounding areas are good. Look here at this site. We quibble and bicker, but we all discuss why it is good/bad. Just realize that this won't fix the problem of traffic, it just gives a half a million people a newer option to get to town, across town, yet still allows for the current infrastructure to be upgraded to ease congestion.
For example. If they built the northern route first and then 6 laned I-12 to Walker, while upgrading US 190, wouldn't you like a route that you could take instead of waiting in construction traffic for hours? I would.
