The multibillion-dollar Baton Rouge Loop project is on track and moving forward, Mayor-President Kip Holden said Monday after a meeting of the Capital Area Expressway Authority.
“This project is not dead by any stretch of the imagination,” Holden said. “We’re still on track for what we had originally proposed.”
The loop is a proposed 85-mile toll road surrounding Baton Rouge that supporters say will alleviate traffic problems.
Last year, the loop project took multiple blows when three of the five parish presidents serving on the authority’s board of directors — Ascension’s Tommy Martinez, Livingston’s Mike Grimmer and Iberville’s J. Mitchell Ourso Jr. — resigned.
A few months later, Gov. Bobby Jindal used his line-item veto to delete $5 million of state spending.
Mike Bruce, managing principal of ABMB Engineers which is one of the lead firms on the loop project, said it’s unclear if the loss of state money affected the timeline.
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by Rebekah Allen at the Advocate
