Recently, I was selected to serve on the board of directors for the Friends of the Lafitte Corridor (FOLC), an organization dedicated to turning an abandoned rail line running from the New Orleans French Quarter into public recreation space and linear park.

The Lafitte Corridor played a huge role in the development of New Orleans. First a canal dug by the Spanish as a route for commerce, the city enclosed the canal and allowed the Great Southern Railway to use the right of way for their rail line into the city. The railway ran through historic neighborhoods like Storyville (red light district and birthplace of jazz) Treme (home to Creoles, voodoo & red beans) and Mid City (Bayou Saint John, streetcars & above ground cemeteries), terminating at Canal and Basin Streets. With the building of New Orleans' Union Passenger Terminal in the 1940's, the railway slowly fell into disuse; most of the tracks were ripped up about a year ago.

Although the bike trail along the Lafitte Corridor has been in New Orleans' master transportation plan for years, funds for the project just began to emerge before Hurricane Katrina. Unfortunately, the catastrophic flooding New Orleans endured due to poorly designed federal flood protection barriers have forced city government to operate in crisis mode for an extended time.

Recognizing that a sharply reduced City Hall staff placed the bike trail and greenway corridor in peril of being lost to developers, a citizen's coalition of neighbors, former residents and local cyclists came together to form FOLC. Though new, FOLC has already received a variety of grants including one from the Rails To Trails Conservancy; to date, over $400,000 has been raised for the project. Additionally, a new film studio known as LIFT is building an initial phase of the trail along the edge of their property so the linear park is certainly moving forward.

Help FOLC Railbank The Historic Lafitte Corridor
Railbanking this former right of way of the Great Southern Railway into a bike trail does more than generate green space; it preserves a corridor that played a central role in the birth of Jazz and the development of New Orleans. Also, a blighted and overgrown corridor can become an enduring symbol of hope and place of recreation that will spur redevelopment and growth at a vital time. As a board member of FOLC, I humbly ask for your help. Visit our new website (folc-nola.org), tell your friends what we're doing and, if possible, donate some time or money to see this project through.

Respectfully,
Larry Lagarde

Labels: bike trail, bikeway, commuting, rail bank, rail banking, rail trail, recreation, transportation