News
Apr 13 2008
Landrieu gets BR bike path $1 million
The bike path that runs along the top of the Mississippi River levee from downtown Baton Rouge [Louisiana] to LSU is about to get about 9,500 feet longer, thanks to a federal earmark arranged by U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu.
City-parish Chief Engineer Bryan Harmon said Congress appropriated $1 million in the federal transportation bill to extend the levee-top bike path from Skip Bertman Drive to BREC’s Farr Horse Activity Center, located about half mile south of Brightside Lane.
The city-parish already had begun designing the project but had no money for construction, Harmon said.
In a telephone interview Friday, Landrieu, D-La., said the project was requested by Mayor-President Kip Holden.
“I know earmarks have gotten a bad name, but they’re really just projects,” Landrieu said.
She noted that every year, there are thousands of requests, but only a few hundred actually get funded.
Landrieu said she pushed this particular project because she thinks it is important for the downtown riverfront.
“I thinks it’s a great investment, and I was happy to do it,” Landrieu said.
The project is an extension of the three-mile-long, 15-foot-wide paved path from Skip Bertman Drive to downtown that opened in 2006.
That project totaled $2.2 million, and included 150 lamp posts.
Harmon said the second phase does not include money for lighting.
Harmon said a formal agreement needs to be worked out between the state and the city-parish to access the allocation through the Federal Highway Administration.
Bruce Wickert, who chairs the Capital Region Planning Commission’s bike and pedestrian committee, applauded Landrieu’s efforts to fund the second phase of the levee bike path.
“This project kind of got put on hold when those two ladies visited us in 2005,” Wickert said, referring to hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Wickert noted that $250,000 is in the works to study the possibility of extending the levee bike path all the way to New Orleans.
The Pontchartrain Levee District is putting up $50,000 toward the master plan to study the proposed 110-mile bike path, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has agreed to provide an additional $125,000.
East Baton Rouge and other parishes with levees on the eastern side of the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans are funding the remainder of the study.
Estimated cost of the project is $33 million. Wickert noted that a bike path has already been constructed from Audubon Park in New Orleans north almost to Norco.
Federal grants could cover 80 percent of the Baton Rouge to New Orleans bike path project, but the remaining “match” would have to come from state and local sources.
City-parish Chief Engineer Bryan Harmon said Congress appropriated $1 million in the federal transportation bill to extend the levee-top bike path from Skip Bertman Drive to BREC’s Farr Horse Activity Center, located about half mile south of Brightside Lane.
The city-parish already had begun designing the project but had no money for construction, Harmon said.
In a telephone interview Friday, Landrieu, D-La., said the project was requested by Mayor-President Kip Holden.
“I know earmarks have gotten a bad name, but they’re really just projects,” Landrieu said.
She noted that every year, there are thousands of requests, but only a few hundred actually get funded.
Landrieu said she pushed this particular project because she thinks it is important for the downtown riverfront.
“I thinks it’s a great investment, and I was happy to do it,” Landrieu said.
The project is an extension of the three-mile-long, 15-foot-wide paved path from Skip Bertman Drive to downtown that opened in 2006.
That project totaled $2.2 million, and included 150 lamp posts.
Harmon said the second phase does not include money for lighting.
Harmon said a formal agreement needs to be worked out between the state and the city-parish to access the allocation through the Federal Highway Administration.
Bruce Wickert, who chairs the Capital Region Planning Commission’s bike and pedestrian committee, applauded Landrieu’s efforts to fund the second phase of the levee bike path.
“This project kind of got put on hold when those two ladies visited us in 2005,” Wickert said, referring to hurricanes Katrina and Rita.
Wickert noted that $250,000 is in the works to study the possibility of extending the levee bike path all the way to New Orleans.
The Pontchartrain Levee District is putting up $50,000 toward the master plan to study the proposed 110-mile bike path, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has agreed to provide an additional $125,000.
East Baton Rouge and other parishes with levees on the eastern side of the Mississippi River between Baton Rouge and New Orleans are funding the remainder of the study.
Estimated cost of the project is $33 million. Wickert noted that a bike path has already been constructed from Audubon Park in New Orleans north almost to Norco.
Federal grants could cover 80 percent of the Baton Rouge to New Orleans bike path project, but the remaining “match” would have to come from state and local sources.
