NEW ORLEANS — With roughly 200 days until Super Bowl 59, the City is undertaking hundreds of infrastructure projects before the big game.
But some sidewalk and road repairs in the CBD have created a headache. If you're driving downtown, prepare for congestion.
At Moto Julia on Julia Street, General Sales Manager, Kyle McGovern, said his view of holes and cones started a couple of weeks ago. Ever since the construction has slashed the number of available parking spaces and walk-in customers.
Not to mention, it's impacted the store's events.
“Usually, we’ll have bikes pulled out. We utilize most of the street and the sidewalk, but we actually had to rent a space across the street to accommodate, which is unfortunate," McGovern said.
Julia and Poydras Streets are under construction. At certain locations, lanes are closed.
Work along the CCC continues as lights are installed and traffic to and from the West Bank has been affected.
State Coordinator for Infrastructure and Economic Development, Michael Hecht, said project managers are making sure the projects are staggered so they don't make traffic jams worse.
“I want to first apologize to everybody for all the work and thank them for their forbearance and I guess just remind everybody that sometimes it takes great pain to make great art," Hecht said.
Businesses said they were aware New Orleans would host the Super Bowl next year, but they did not receive any notice about the work.
“No. Zero," McGovern said.
McGovern said the shop would have liked to at least get a letter in the mail.
"This might be a spicy take, but maybe don’t just fix the streets when the Super Bowl is coming to town, maybe get this stuff taken care of throughout the year," McGovern said.
Hecht said agencies across the city are meeting frequently to collaborate on the projects and provide updates.
“Our intention is that the precedent that we’re setting here for the Super Bowl will be one that we sustain going forward," Hecht said.
The hard deadline for the projects is the end of the year, but they hope to complete many by the end of August while students are out of school, Hecht said.
Thankfully, the weather has not created any delays at this time.
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