Friends of Lafitte Corridor: Reclaiming the Heart of the City

Imagine riding your bike through a 3-mile linear park that connects the French Quarter to the Treme, Lafitte, Tulane/Gravier, Mid-City, Faubourg St. John, and Lakeview neighborhoods, and that links to City Park and the Marconi and Wisner bike routes via Bayou St. John. While many cities only dream of acquiring centrally-located land to create a public greenway, New Orleans already owns a largely abandoned rail corridor that could become “much more than a bike path,” according to Bart Everson, president of Friends of Lafitte Corridor.

In June, over 150 hikers gathered at the gates of Armstrong Park for FOLC’s 5th Annual Hike of the Laffite Corridor. They walked together along the largely derelict stretch of the Norfolk Southern Rail Line that runs between Basin Street and Canal Boulevard hoping that plans to convert the space to a public greenway will come to fruition.

“In Treme, unfortunately, we don’t really have a nice place for the kids to play,” says Leonetta Terrell, a social worker, FOLC board member, and Treme resident. “On my block, they play in the street, but the greenway offers so much potential.”

FOLC, a volunteer-led nonprofit, brings together community members, neighborhood leaders, public health and design professionals, elected officials, public servants, and community cultural organizations to envision and advocate for this public space. In December of 2007, they released a Master Plan that would connect neighborhoods, encourage reinvestment in Katrina-damaged neighborhoods and commercial centers, launch an interpretive trail that could be enjoyed by locals and tourists, provide safe transportation and recreation options, and implement best practices in urban and environmental sustainability.

Lake Douglas, a landscape architect and FOLC board member, describes the Corridor as “a green spine that intertwines our social, economic, cultural and environmental history.” Just steps off the Corridor are countless important sites—from Congo Square to Buddy Bolden’s grave at Holt Cemetery to the site where the D-Day boats were built.

Board member Edgar Chase captures the scope of the project, “The impact on surrounding neighborhoods will likely be significant in that the corridor presents the tangible common thread that links hard-working, fun-loving, faith-filled people of diverse neighborhoods and cultures together.”

David Waggonner, of local architecture firm Waggoner & Ball, emphasizes the environmental significance of the Corridor, “These perpendicular radians between river and lake are vital, because the way we manipulate or manage them will let us invent a new city.”

So far, the city has selected Design Workshop of Austin, Texas, to plan and design the project, which will—everyone hopes—break ground next year, and the state has committed $2.6 million from federal Community Development Block Grant disaster recovery funds and $398,000 of state funds for the project.

A recent $50,000 grant from the Greater New Orleans Foundation will fund the initial research needed to design and implement a sustainable water design program. Waggonner & Ball will be directing this phase.

“We’re not going to do all of this planning if we don’t know the grades, elevations, soil, and groundwater information, because that is fundamental,” says Waggonner.

Implementing best practices along the Corridor could inform the way the city lives with water.

“The location of our water design program would be the Corridor, but the application could be throughout the city,” remarks Douglas.

To learn more about FOLC and join their team, visit their website at www.folc-nola.org.