JR Ball: Bridging the intelligence gap

Bridging the intelligence gap

JR BALL

IT WAS A revelation unlike any other.

Never in the field of human endeavor have so many been so dumbfounded by such a simple truth.

Picture a group of gobsmacked flat-earthers having to reconsider their most ardent of beliefs after being confronted by … a globe.

So, you might wonder, what was this gut punch to the human condition?

The startling reveal that eight out of every 10 vehicles slogging across the current “new” Mississippi Bridge and then clogging Interstate 10 are being driven by locals crawling their way across the Baton Rouge metro.

Wait … what?

The numbers, like hips, don’t lie. And it’s true that pretty much all the vehicles parked daily on I-10 belong to residents of Baton Rouge and its neighboring parishes.

But, c’mon, you already knew that … right?

Only a fool—or someone remarkably blind to the bajillion local private school decals adorning all those pickup trucks, SUVs, luxury sedans and Subarus—would think otherwise.

Which is precisely why your world should be turning upside down by the jaw-dropping reality that our cavalcade of highly paid transportation “experts” were utterly clueless about Baton Rouge’s worst-kept traffic secret.

Was it even a secret?

Migraines were invented for absurdities like this.

Among the oblivious count Fred Raiford—a court jester of a man who’s in charge of traffic for city-parish government, a member of the Capital Area Road and Bridge District and the architect behind many of the planning and transportation disasters over the past 20-plus years.

“That is almost unbelievable that it is 80% local traffic,” a stunned Raiford was quoted as saying by The Advocate. “It’s a little eye-opening.”

Wow.

And you want to be my latex salesman.

Equally stupefying is the truth bomb dropped on Kara Moree, project manager for Atlas Technical Consultants, the group advising our little banana republic. No way did she see this coming, reckoning that 50% of the traffic grinding its way through Baton Rouge would be folks doing their damnedest to get somewhere other than here.

Doing her best Captain Louis Renault impersonation, Moree says she was shocked, shocked to find “we use I-10 as a surface street.”

“C’mon man. What we doin’ out here, man?”

Given that, can we believe anything coming out of her well-paid pie hole?

A flabbergast of such magnitude hasn’t been witnessed in these parts since November 1993 when pigs went airborne after Curley Hallman and his otherwise underachieving Tigers took down mighty Alabama, the defending national champion and winners of 31 straight.

Now seems like a good time to revisit a three-paragraph passage from a column I wrote in early April:

For decades upon decades taxpayers in Baton Rouge and across the Capital Region have been unwilling to pony up the tax dollars necessary to build a functioning local infrastructure. Consequently, as we’ve sprawled to the far reaches of East Baton Rouge Parish and deep into Ascension and Livingston parishes, the solution has been to funnel traffic onto I-10 and I-12, making it a federal problem.

So, it should surprise no one that, according to a traffic engineer friend, 75% to 80% of I-10 traffic in the Baton Rouge area is of the local variety. That figure jumps to 90%-plus during peakhour traffic.

Which means this new bridge isn’t about making it easier to go from Lafayette to New Orleans or Orange Beach, it’s about getting Capital Region locals to and from work each day. (End of rehash.)

This information has been around—and readily available in a report likely collecting dust somewhere in the bowels of Raiford’s department—since those heady days of the Kip Holden administration when building a public-private northern loop around Baton Rouge was all the rage.

How much money are we paying these brainiac consultants for information we’ve had in our possession for more than a decade?

Raise your hand if you think there’s been some seismic shift in the cause and effect of Baton Rouge gridlock generation.

Something is wrong—very, very wrong—when a columnist of limited intelligence has better and more accurate information on our traffic nightmare than 1) the person in charge of transportation for this parish and 2) the alleged expert who’s pocketing a hefty helping of our tax dollars to share her remarkable consultant insights.

How can I get on this consultant gravy train?

Checking back with the engineer who’s advising me for free: He says the only feasible location for a new new bridge—if the goal is unclogging the daily jam on the existing new bridge—is one that goes from the west bank and ties into East Baton Rouge somewhere between Brightside Drive and Bluebonnet Boulevard.

Raiford, our resident genius, however, says that’s a no-go because there’s already too much traffic in that area inching its way toward I-10.

Why? Because connected surface street grids matter and Raiford and other local planning and transportation officials are either A) too ignorant to understand this fact, B) too gutless to require the right thing before approving new development, C) devoid of even a modicum of vision, or D) all the above.

Want proof? Just look at the scores upon scores of single-entrance subdivisions and developments that rely almost exclusively on Bluebonnet to reach civilization.

Which then opens the door for people like Mitch Ourso, the parochial parish president of Iberville, to demand $3 billion be spent on an out-of-the-way bridge that might attract a few tax-generating gas stations, convenience stores and strip retail centers to his kingdom but won’t do much in addressing the actual problem.

Let’s return to the numbers: Projections show an out of the way bridge will only reduce I-10 traffic through Baton Rouge by 19%—or roughly 24,000 of the 126,000 vehicles that daily cross the Mississippi River bridge. For comparisons sake, that’s essentially the same number of vehicles that make the daily schlep across both the Sunshine Bridge and the “old” Mississippi River bridge near Southern University. The Audubon Bridge, near St. Francisville, is used by just over 6,000 vehicles daily.

But, hey, why should the new, new bridge be any different than the Sunshine and Audubon bridges—two Mississippi-crossing edifices that carry way less traffic than officials predicted when telling us just how badly we needed them.

Shawn Wilson, secretary for the state Department of Transportation and Development—in full CYA mode— says don’t focus on the numbers behind the curtain. Rather, embrace the joy that a little bit is better than nada.

This in no way is to suggest a new bridge over the Mississippi isn’t needed. It’s a critical component in a multifront battle

But are we going to choose a bridge location that brings the best ROI or are we going to continue operating in the Louisiana Way?

That’s the $3 billion question.