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You will save gas. Sitting in traffic eats a lot more gas than driving 55-60 mph when you have the same distance to go.
The florida tolls were very pro-active and I think the loop here is being pro-active, considering how far behind we are. To build a loop now that only has sparsely populated areas, the loop would start at lafayette and end near covington, making it useless for BR. But what the engineers are trying to do now is find the area most effective with the least amount of residents. But somehow, there will be displacements and the government will have to buy up land. But to do it smart and respectful is the key.
Without double decking the interstate (which is prohibitively expensive) what can be done to shorten commuter times, expand our infrastructure, and do it with revenue streams that we can obtain (with a $14 Billion backlog of DOTD projects, new roads aren't going to financed by them)?
I'm not saying the loop is the end-all, be-all. But it is one piece of a puzzle, and I am open to other suggestions. Just one, in my opinion, just seems to fit us best right now. Light rail is my favorite, but the infrastructure cost is high and a scarcity of private (or public) financiers make this unlikely. Besides, CATS is underused and a mass transit line would only have meek ridership. Widening the interstate is only a stop-gap method, causing more snareups.
oh, and by the way, a shareholder or stakeholder is a resident of the 5-parish area. Your opinions count and that is why they hold public input meetings. If you weren't, they would be buying land right now.
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