I10 widening to start tomorrow!

[all2neat]

Has anyone else been using i10 past seigen and notice the maasive line to exit at highland. If it keeps up they are going to have to do something to help out. A dedicated lane onto perkins might help or god forbid a new exit on bayou manchac I think is the next overpass.

[Antrell Williams]

Has anyone else been using i10 past seigen and notice the maasive line to exit at highland. If it keeps up they are going to have to do something to help out. A dedicated lane onto perkins might help or god forbid a new exit on bayou manchac I think is the next overpass.

They need to add an exit at Bluff Rd and continue that corridor onto Perkins Rd instead of having to turn right onto Perkins from Bluff.

[richyb83]

Have not had the chance to see that yet....I-12 did a nice job extending the Bass Pro exit into a 4th lane for a few hundred yards...maybe I-10 at Highland can follow suit

 

I-10 could sure use an exit for Hwy 928 Bluff Road/Old Perkins Rd Hwy427

 

Glad to see the extra lanes for I-10 will extended to Hwy22 one day!

[buckett5425]

Has anyone else been using i10 past seigen and notice the maasive line to exit at highland. If it keeps up they are going to have to do something to help out. A dedicated lane onto perkins might help or god forbid a new exit on bayou manchac I think is the next overpass.

  My boss takes that way home as well. I asked him how traffic was now that there are three lanes and he mentioned the same problem. DOTD did say the roadway was handling 20,000 fewer cars a day during construction, as those people took alternate routes and now that its complete, those cars have returned...

 

#induceddemand

[cajun]

Demand already seems to be there for improvements into AP...enduced by decades of poor performing public schools, forced busing, incompetent leadership, a hateful populace, inept police force, and high crime within Baton Rouge.

#induceddemand

[itsjustme3]

Isn't there road construction on Highland (at Blue Bayou)? That doesn't help

[buckett5425]

Demand already seems to be there for improvements into AP...enduced by decades of poor performing public schools, forced busing, incompetent leadership, a hateful populace, inept police force, and high crime within Baton Rouge.

#induceddemand

 

So true! But we will never be able to save ourselves from Baton Rouge until we get that loop built! 

[cajun]

So true! But we will never be able to save ourselves from Baton Rouge until we get that loop built!

It can't get here fast enough. People have been voting for these kinds of projects with their feet for a long time now. If Baton Rouge was a welcoming and attractive place for people in all walks of life, the suburbs wouldn't be so popular.

Who knows...maybe you can run for governor one day and build a wall around the city and force people to stay. You can run it like Jonestown...or maybe Angola.

Sprawl will happen one way or another to a city like Baton Rouge until things improve dramatically. A loop at least gets some of it off the two major arteries instead of ever farther down the I-12.

The truth is that while Baton Rouge leaders remain focused on shoveling taxpayer dollars into downtown and a pathetic excuse for a bus system, no one is addressing the fundamental problems that are driving people away. It's not getting any better, and ignoring it will only make it more difficult to solve.

[all2neat]

Isn't there road construction on Highland (at Blue Bayou)? That doesn't help

that construction has beem done for a long time now.

[buckett5425]

It can't get here fast enough. People have been voting for these kinds of projects with their feet for a long time now. If Baton Rouge was a welcoming and attractive place for people in all walks of life, the suburbs wouldn't be so popular.

Who knows...maybe you can run for governor one day and build a wall around the city and force people to stay. You can run it like Jonestown...or maybe Angola.

Sprawl will happen one way or another to a city like Baton Rouge until things improve dramatically. A loop at least gets some of it off the two major arteries instead of ever farther down the I-12.

The truth is that while Baton Rouge leaders remain focused on shoveling taxpayer dollars into downtown and a pathetic excuse for a bus system, no one is addressing the fundamental problems that are driving people away. It's not getting any better, and ignoring it will only make it more difficult to solve.

 

 

Agreed!

 

Our leaders need to spend more time listening to our concerns instead of unions and special interests! We are all too busy working and raising families and unable to find time to be a part of the solution! If our leaders can't get their act together, moving to the suburbs where everyone thinks, acts and looks like me will be the best option for my family. Truth. 

[Antrell Williams]

Sprawl will happen one way or another to a city like Baton Rouge until things improve dramatically. A loop at least gets some of it off the two major arteries instead of ever farther down the I-12.

The truth is that while Baton Rouge leaders remain focused on shoveling taxpayer dollars into downtown and a pathetic excuse for a bus system, no one is addressing the fundamental problems that are driving people away. It's not getting any better, and ignoring it will only make it more difficult to solve.

A loop will create just as much traffic, I'm afraid. We do need more freeway infrastructure here but what we severely lack is a competent street grid.

 

It doesn't help to have an administration keen on stripping the little funding the schools get. That's is where most of the problem rests.

 

The approach the mayor's office is attempting is spend heavily and hope investment comes later, it works and sometimes it doesn't. The spending downtown has resulted into a profit maker for the city-parish. With the exception of the TIF hotels and the IBM project. I am somewhat satisfied with downtown at the moment and am ready for that style of investment into Mid-City, Scotlandville/BTR, and OSBR. These neighborhoods are where the schools are, these neighborhoods are where the poor are, and there lies the potential of the entire city and not just people my age bar hopping on 3rd St (which is fun).

 

Businesses want to be in attractive cities and the utmost important thing is profit. If the margin for profit exceeds the amount of crime and gridlock this region is capable of, they are happy. More business in turn provides more tax paying jobs.

 

Then there's the more conservative (not political) approach of investing more in schools, law enforcement and rehabilitation, and attracting jobs. Which provides the funding to spend money on the pretty perks. Assuming either are successful.

 

The former is much much more fun, much more effective on the polls, and has much more impact on the average voter. I like both ways of improving the local economy but the best way is probably a little bit of both.

[cajun]

A loop wouldn't create any more traffic that wasn't already going to happen elsewhere. It will redirect some traffic from I-10 and provide a major transportation upgrade to the regional grid. My ideal scenario is to keep as much of the loop within the parish as possible- mainly using the Airline route while improving arteries like Hooper or highway 61 and focusing redevelopment efforts on north BR inside of the Airline highway loop.

Some seem to believe that sprawl is caused by roads projects like this. Those are confusing correlation with causation. It's not surprising that the same people who would rather attack the symptoms than the problem itself call themselves evangelical new urbanists. They are no less full of excrement than your average politician. So many subscribe to the belief that you can dump money into select neighborhoods while ignoring schools, crime, and other key drivers of sprawl. A decaying inner city core isn't the problem. It's a symptom. Spending money downtown without addressing the reasons people are leaving the city is only delaying the inevitable. A city that attracts young people that uproot and leave the second their kids turn 5 isn't much of a city.

While new freeways do influence development patterns (no one denies that), they don't enable new sprawl any more than crappy inner city public schools and high crime. That dynamic already exists in BR and leaders have done nothing to change that. It's the primary reason people are leaving the city. If nothing is done, their employers will slowly move to outlying areas as well or leave the region completely.

The demand for suburban housing exist already. They are built and developed every day farther and farther down I-10 and I-12. All a loop would do is encourage more linear development in northern EBR, WBR, and other areas on it's route.

The development along the loop will come at the expense of far out, less desirable suburbs along existing freeways (like Walker).....not Baton Rouge. Baton Rouge was never going to keep those people without a new SEBR district. The city doesn't even really seem to want them around anyway.

We should be welcoming a loop with open arms. Collectively, Baton Rouge should provide a compelling argument for building or purchasing a new home in the city....and if it can't, the city should be desperately trying to encourage suburvanites to develop areas within their tax pool (inside of EBR) instead of eastern Livingston or way out in Gonzales.

Unlike Jackson or Detroit, the wealthy have not left Baton Rouge (yet). The middle class is another story- and they are critical in numbers to supporting the amenities and job market required of a large city. The closer we can keep them to downtown, the better. We should rejoice every time a suburvanite chooses Zachary, Central, or Brusly over Gonzales or Walker.

I haven't mentioned the leverage a decent loop would provide in attracting distribution and manufacturing jobs to the region.....which is significant in of itself.

[richyb83]

Had to search for the "Official"  I-10 thread....maybe this needs a "Name Change"? with the Widening not tomorrow lol!

 

Here is the website I10BR.com....A citizens "SURVEY" on the "Left" that will run until the end of the month of May...sorry not much head's up(less than a week)... & a Cool Video i'm in the process of watching...it is over 16 minutes long. Neat at abt 3 minutes they go back to 1954 with the original BR Expressway (near Capitol/Memorial Stadium)

 

http://i10br.com/

 

DOTD examines I-10 Improvements west of the Mississippi River Bridge and the I-10 / I-12 Split

 

As traffic issues continue to rise along the I-10 corridor in the Baton Rouge area, DOTD has opted to re-open discussions within the community regarding finding appropriate solutions to those issues. The current study is the first step in determining the feasibility of any improvements to the area of I-10 between the Mississippi River Bridge and the 10/12 split. The state will work with community residents and merchants to create concepts for improving the corridor, with an open ear toward community ideas

[all2neat]

I took the survey. Hopefully the community steps up and decides to deal with the issue and move forward.

[Mr. Burnham]

Took the survey, hopefully it leads to some improvements. Maybe a new bridge or new route to bypass most traffic.

[richyb83]

Glad y'all took the survey...looks like the deadline has been extended to June 15th

[dan326]

I took it, but I don't know what they can do without messing up the adjacent communities.

[Mr. Burnham]

I took it, but I don't know what they can do without messing up the adjacent communities.

Yeah, they can't really add more lanes for most of it. The only option is a loop, but even that would mess up communities. 

 

I say we just 'Houstonize' the city   

[dan326]

"Houstonize"?

[Mr. Burnham]

"Houstonize"?

Build tons of freeways within the city that carve it up and make it "easier to travel around":

 

[richyb83]

That's a Houston-style looking freeway system for sure!  Too bad the Mighty Mississippi would never allow that many bridges...& for BR those two Southwest freeways would have to hook back down to the south on the proposed Westbank Expressway toward Donaldsonville...got to protect the Atchafaylaya Basin...

 

 

 

[greg225]

Im for the exits on the interstate being on the leftside, but aganist a new Mississippi bridge in Baton Rouge. I love to see a larger interstate system with more lanes and express lanes that you would have to pay tolls to use. Mass transit should be on this survey it can help with traffic to.                                                                                               

[Mr. Burnham]

Im for the exits on the interstate being on the leftside, but aganist a new Mississippi bridge in Baton Rouge. I love to see a larger interstate system with more lanes and express lanes that you would have to pay tolls to use. Mass transit should be on this survey it can help with traffic to.                                                                                               

 You don't want a second bridge? What kind of world are you living in, the city NEEDS a second bridge.

[greg225]

 You don't want a second bridge? What kind of world are you living in, the city NEEDS a second bridge.

The city have a under used second bridge in NBR, so if we get another bridge that would be 3. I don't think another bridge will solve the traffic problem a lot of people think it would fix the problem, but I think another thing we can be done the bridge we have. Currently bridges we have can have 2 express lanes and more people need to used the old bridge. Airline Hwy need to be used more to connect to the old bridge.

[ehyfield]

This doesn't even show the Grand Parkway (3rd loop) around the city.