‘Vision’ for comprehensive plan unveiled today

A summary of what could be Baton Rouge’s next comprehensive plan is being released to the public today. FuturEBR, as the plan has been known, was led by Fregonese Associates, a Portland, Ore.-based firm, with input from a parish-wide survey and a series of public workshops. The final plan will be released in April, with a first hearing before the Planning Commission expected in May, says John Fregonese, who has been working on the plan for over a year. “This is intended to start the conversation to get people familiar with what’s going to be in the plan,” he says. The plan targets six key areas for residential and commercial development: Downtown, Mid City, LSU/Old South Baton Rouge/Nicholson Drive/North Gate, Southern University/Scotlandville/Zion City/airport, a south Baton Rouge medical district between the Mall of Louisiana and the Pennington Biomedical Research Center, and the area around the Broadmoor Shopping Center and Cortana Square. “Those aren’t the only areas of growth, but those are the areas we think could benefit the most from some concentrated planning and revitalization,” Fregonese says. Nicholson Drive is seen as a potential transit corridor, possibly for a streetcar line from downtown to Tiger Stadium. Eventually the streetcar might run through campus and down Perkins Road to the Mall of Louisiana. The line would help spur development along Nicholson and help the medical district, which has serious traffic congestion and is in need of better connectivity, Fregonese says. A draft of the plan will be posted on the FuturEBR website here. — David Jacobs