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Importance of LA Highway 1
Proposed Highway Improvements
The Challenge to Build a Better Highway
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Port Fourchon offers the best access
to deepwater
oil and gas production in
the Gulf of Mexico.
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Louisiana’s southernmost port is Port Fourchon, strategically located in the central Gulf region where it serves as a focal point of deepwater oil and gas activities. Located on the Gulf of Mexico only six miles from the 50-foot contour and connected to an efficient inland waterway system, Port Fourchon has significant logistical advantages. These factors also make it an ideal location for future port development to meet expanding U.S. trade activity. However, the only roadway connecting the port to the rest of the nation is the vulnerable, two-lane LA Hwy. 1 system.
- Within a 40-mile radius of Port Fourchon, there are over 600 platforms, and 75 percent of deepwater projects are in the port’s service area.
- A Corps of Engineers’ study projects that 58 percent of all Louisiana offshore drilling over the next 30 years will be in Port Fourchon’s service area.
- According to then-Acting Director Thomas Kitsos of the MMS, “Port Fourchon is one of the Gulf of Mexico’s main service bases for OCS activities...the port’s importance to our nation’s energy infrastructure is significant. LA Hwy. 1, the main land-based mode of transport to and from the port, is also vital.”
Unlike many states, Louisiana has embraced the offshore oil and gas industry, and with little fanfare. While heightened OCS activity has produced billions of dollars in federal royalty payments, it has also taken a toll on infrastructure like LA Hwy. 1, and the state has received little money to mitigate these impacts. The Gulf of Mexico is one of the top hydrocarbon-producing areas in the world and plays an integral part in national energy security. While the Persian Gulf provides 23 percent of the U.S. oil supply, Port Fourchon plays a supporting role in providing approximately 18 percent of all domestic oil and gas and 13 percent of imports. Clearly, the ability of the United States to meet its current and future oil and gas needs safely and securely is critically dependent on the integrity of LA Hwy. 1.
- Federal OCS lease sales and royalty from oil and gas activities off Louisiana’s coast generate approximately $5.5 billion annually for the U.S. Treasury, and over 56,000 jobs in this region are tied to the oil and gas industry.
- The Louisiana OCS territory is the most extensively developed and matured OCS territory in the U.S., having produced over 88 percent of crude oil and over 82 percent of natural gas extracted from the OCS through the year 2000.
- Analysts predict that losing access to Port Fourchon could choke our national energy supply, sending gas prices to over $3 per gallon.
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Supertankers unload crude oil
at LOOP, an important entry point
for the nation’s foreign oil supply.
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The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port (LOOP), the first and only offshore oil terminal operating in the United States, is located less than 20 miles south of Port Fourchon in the Gulf of Mexico. It allows for the safe off-loading of supertankers into pipelines that connect to over 50 percent of this nation’s refining capacity. Booster pumps at Port Fourchon convey crude oil from LOOP to underground salt dome storage areas in Galliano, Louisiana, located along LA Hwy. 1.
- LOOP is estimated to take in 14 percent of the nation’s imported crude oil.
- LOOP transports approximately one million barrels of foreign oil and 300,000 barrels of domestic crude from Gulf of Mexico OCS each day.
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LA Hwy. 1 following Tropical Storm Josephine.
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LA Hwy. 1 is included as part of the National Highway System (NHS), roads considered to be the backbone of the U.S. transportation system. The NHS comprises only four percent of the country’s total highways; however, these highways service 90 percent of all businesses and industries in the country. Considering that a large percentage of all intermodal cargo handled at Port Fourchon is transferred by large trucks, and the only route for these trucks is along LA Hwy. 1, improving the existing substandard and unsafe highway system is critical.
- Currently, over 10,000 vehicles travel on LA Hwy. 1 daily to and from Port Fourchon, 1,000 of which are cargo trucks. The impact of that tonnage traveling continuously along LA Hwy. 1, combined with coastal land loss, is causing this critical highway system to literally fall apart.
- A Louisiana State University study authorized by the MMS, determined that actual highway speed is 30 percent below the intended rate and that only 2 percent of LA Hwy. 1 is NOT in need of improvements.
- It is estimated there will be an 80 percent increase in truck traffic on LA Hwy. 1 over the course of the next decade.
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The two-lane Leeville Bridge is a critical link in the event
of hurricane evacuation. When a shrimp boat collided
with the bridge in 2001, traffic along LA Hwy. 1
was stopped for three hours.
Photo by Josh Lott of NOAA.
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The failing LA Hwy. 1 system is one of the deadliest highway systems in the state for motorists. According to Louisiana Oil Spill Coordinator Roland Guidry, it is also quite possibly the single most important highway for emergency oil spill response, and yet one of the most vulnerable to flooding and deterioration.
- Along the southernmost portion of the highway, state transportation officials recorded 5,087 automobile accidents and 77 deaths between 1990 and 1996.
- A Louisiana State University study authorized by the MMS, determined that actual highway speed is 30 percent below the intended rate and that only 2 percent of LA Hwy. 1 is NOT in need of improvements.
- The highway provides the only overland transport of support services, including oil spill and emergency response teams, through the ecologically sensitive Barataria and Terrebonne estuary areas. Without a dependable highway, response time to these areas is far greater and the risk of a catastrophic impact is greatly increased.
Nearly two-thirds of the population of Louisiana live in the southern portions of the state. These areas are rich in resources and culture, yet susceptible to the dangers posed by hurricanes. With the acceleration of land loss, there is an ever-increasing threat that existing LA Hwy. 1 could be washed out or rendered impassable during a hurricane threat.
- The LA Hwy. 1 corridor is the evacuation route for residents of communities in south Lafourche and Grand Isle, as well as 6,000 offshore workers. Add to this equation large amounts of heavy equipment that must be evacuated along the two-lane, substandard highway, and you have a serious safety issue that warrants attention.
The seafood industry is an integral part of Louisiana’s economy and the state is the nation’s largest producer of seafood. LA Hwy. 1 is the dividing line between the two most productive estuaries in the nation: Barataria and Terrebonne.
- It is estimated that 54 percent of the state’s total commercial landings between 1989 and 1992 were derived from this system.
- Each day, approximately 20 percent of Louisiana’s value of seafood travels over LA Hwy. 1.
Along LA Hwy. 1, there are numerous tourist attractions important to the cultural communities inhabited by Acadians, Creoles and Cajuns, including plantation homes, historic sites, bayous and swamp tours.
- Lafourche parish offers world-class recreational possibilities, however, notoriously poor roads like LA Hwy. 1 and traffic congestion continue to hinder efforts to attract more tourism to the region.
- LA Hwy. 1 leads to Louisiana’s only inhabited barrier island, Grand Isle, home to the sandy beaches of a 140-acre state park. Each year, hundreds of thousands of visitors flock to the coast, and Grand Isle’s population more than doubles during the summer.
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