Emily Gregoire works at the LSU Foundation, but doesn’t call Baton Rouge home. Her husband works at a chemical plant in Donaldsonville, but they don’t live in the ever-growing Ascension Parish either.
Instead, as Business Report details in a new feature, the couple, like a growing number of young families, has settled along the southern edge of West Baton Rouge Parish—and have grown quite fond of it.
In Addis, they’ve found a middle ground. Gregoire’s husband, Blake, drives 30 miles south to work with minimal traffic, while she travels 10 miles to LSU, across the heavily-trafficked Mississippi River Bridge. The good news: Gregoire can depart Interstate 10 at the first exit off the bridge, avoiding the dreaded I-10/I-110 merger.
“We enjoy Addis because it’s close to Baton Rouge but not in Baton Rouge,” she says. “It’s not necessarily a small town, but it’s a close-knit community. We have a grocery store five seconds from our house and restaurants we can go to. It’s growing.”
West Baton Rouge was the state’s sixth fastest-growing parish from 2014 to 2016, with a 2.56% population increase, according to the Census Bureau and NOLA.com. That’s below the growth seen by Baton Rouge’s other suburban parishes—Ascension and Livingston—but real estate experts predict the continued revitalization of downtown Baton Rouge will increase West Baton Rouge’s popularity.
“Because of everything going on downtown, West Baton Rouge is a really attractive option,” says RE/MAX agent Kyle Peterson, who studies the local market for the annual TRENDS in Real Estate seminar. “I think it’s been growing under the radar.”
Still, heavy Interstate 10 traffic crossing the Mississippi River remains the biggest obstacle to growth.
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