Consultants unveiled a map Thursday showing several possible corridors for the proposed $4 billion Baton Rouge loop, stretching from the Sunshine Bridge (La. 70) to the south to a possible corridor between Baker and Zachary to the north.
At this point, engineers are studying the potential corridors — which range from 1,000 feet to 4,000 feet in width — to determine whether they will affect wetlands, state and federal lands, churches, schools and cemeteries, said consulting engineer Mike Bruce of ABMB Engineers.
“There’s not a corridor on this map that doesn’t have some kind of an impact. We’re going to try our best to minimize the impact, but we have to come up with routes that will relieve traffic congestion and make the loop viable,” Bruce told a loop committee.
As part of the planning process, the consultants must show state and federal agencies that they have looked at every possible route for the proposed toll-supported loop within the 11,000-square-mile “doughnut” identified around heavily populated areas of East Baton Rouge and Livingston parishes, Bruce said.
“This is the beginning of the process, not the end,” Bruce said, noting that the proposed corridors are likely to change over the next few weeks as engineers assess possible negative effects.
Walter Monsour, chief administrative officer for East Baton Rouge Mayor-President Kip Holden, said the key to a successful loop is relieving traffic.
“The more traffic you relieve, the more tolls will be generated,” he said.
Monsour said the extreme north and south routes may not prove feasible because motorists may not want to travel too far out of their way to pay the tolls and use the loop.
In all, the U.S. Coast Guard and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers have identified 12 possible river crossings for the loop, including a possible revamp and expansion of the U.S. 190 Bridge over the Mississippi River between East Baton Rouge and West Baton Rouge parishes.
But Huey Dugas, planning director for the Capital Region Planning Commission and one of the coordinators of the loop project, said that expanding the U.S. 190 Bridge may not be feasible.
Dugas noted that the state recently let a contract to widen the Huey P. Long Bridge in New Orleans, but the contractor is running into such mammoth problems that he’s questioning the feasibility of the project.
“The U.S. 190 Bridge is a sister bridge to the Huey P. Long, and any efforts to widen it will likely run into similar problems,” Dugas said.
Dugas also noted that recent studies have shown that about 27 percent of the traffic on the Baton Rouge area interstates, Interstates 10 and 12, and major arterials, such as Florida Boulevard, are motorists who are passing through the area.
Rannah Gray, a consultant who is helping to coordinate the loop implement efforts, said plans call for a series of public hearings Sept. 10 through Sept. 13 to let local residents sound off on the potential corridors.
Locations and times are still being worked out, but plans call for hearings to be held in East Baton Rouge, Ascension and Livingston. A fourth hearing will be held on the west side of the Mississippi for West Baton Rouge and Iberville residents.
In addressing the loop stakeholders committee that is supposed to interface with the local communities and businesses, Monsour emphasized the need for all five area parishes to work together.
“Let’s leave politics at the door and let’s think about what’s best for the five-parish region — and should have been done 40 years ago,” he said.
Source:
The Advocate,
SCOTT DYER, John Gipson
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