Despite lying outside both the CATS taxing district and Baton Rouge city limits, L’Auberge Casino & Hotel will pay no fee for benefiting from the Touchdown Express service on LSU football game days.
CATS says the new casino at River Road and Gardere Lane was added to the shuttle service late last week after officials approached L’Auberge about adding Trolley Rouge routes to the casino on weekends. CATS CEO Brian Marshall says adding L’Auberge to the Touchdown Express route will help stimulate the economy by loosening gridlock on corridors that lead to Death Valley.
“The casino isn’t really the beneficiary,” Marshall says.
The casino expects about 300 hotel visitors on game days, he says, and will provide free parking to nonguests riding the Touchdown Express.
“That’s 500 people going to the game from one location,” Marshall says.
L’Auberge is the only shuttle stop located outside of downtown Baton Rouge. On Monday, city officials announced the addition of the North Boulevard Town Square to stops at the corner of Convention and Lafayette streets and under Interstate 110 at Florida Boulevard.
A roundtrip on the shuttle service is also increasing by 50 cents this year, to $4. Marshall says the bump was more about making cash transactions easier for hotels and businesses that sell Touchdown Express tickets rather than boosting revenue. In its third year, the Touchdown Express relies largely on a grant for funding, but is shaping up to be self-sufficient, Marshall says.
“It takes about three years to grow a route,” he says.
Marshall says plans to connect L’Auberge with Trolley Rouge are not finalized.
