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Mike Grimmer and four other parish presidents are scheduled to vote on a new route proposal for the Loop toll road next week.

ABMB Engineers spokesman Steve Wallace said Thursday that planners are now looking at a Loop that would cross Interstate 12 about 2 miles east of Walker and continue north well to the east of residential developments along La. 449.
Grimmer has been meeting with subdivision residents who object to a previously proposed route, possibly passing through eastern Walker and just north of Denham Springs.

Grimmer recently had a digitized aerial map made showing Loop planners exactly how much development now exists in the eastern Walker area and west of Weyerhaeuser property.
Weyerhaeuser owns about 130,000 acres in commercial timber in Livingston Parish.

Grimmer said he was trying to revive plans for a Loop running more to the east and the north of the previous proposal. That route could use undeveloped Weyerhaeuser property north and south of Interstate 12, Grimmer said.
Loop engineers initially rejected that idea because it seemed too far away from populated areas to generate adequate toll revenue.
Grimmer pointed out that at the current rate of subdivision growth, by the time Loop construction begins, development would have caught up with the toll road.

The Loop is now proposed to enter Livingston Parish across the Amite River north of Port Vincent, curve north through sparsely settled land and cross I-12 and U.S. 190 east of Walker.
The Loop will cross the Amite River again, possibly north of Watson, and then pass between Zachary and Baker.

Baton Rouge is paying for the Loop engineering study now underway, but the Legislature has appropriated funds to keep the project moving.
In 1997, the Legislature gave future toll authorities the same expropriation powers as the Department of Transportation and Development (Act 1017).
The Legislature has an estimated $14 billion shortfall in state highway maintenance and is investing in the Loop as a way to supplement tax dollars with private investment and toll revenue.

Grimmer has said he wants to find the least intrusive route through Livingston Parish. Then he will ask for input from the people living nearest to that route.
Grimmer said he has been receiving hundreds of e-mails a week, mostly from residents who think the process is further along than it actually is.
"If at the end of the day, Livingston Parish is not for the Loop, then I'm not for it," Grimmer said. "But I'm not going to turn my back on it now and sit and watch the traffic back up further and further on I-12."

Source: Livingston Parish News