EBR traffic backed up by start of school and Isaac effects

Published Sep 7, 2012 at 10:00 am (Updated Sep 7, 2012)

If your morning commute has been noticeably longer this week and you're wondering why, it's due to the hangover of Hurricane Isaac on the traffic light system and the unavoidable congestion that comes with the start of school. "Mostly it's school traffic," says city-parish traffic engineer Ingolf Partenheimer, noting that gridlock can increase 15% to 20% in the Capital Region each year when school begins. Add a traffic light system still destabilized from Isaac's winds, and the commute woes deepen. Partenheimer says that, for the 500 intersections in the area, about 400 cameras help keep traffic flowing. But all of them were potentially knocked out of synchronization by the storm. He says the engineering department has nine workers checking each camera to make sure they're pointing in the right direction. When the cameras are not pointed where they're supposed to be, the lights get out of sync. Green lights for left turns can get especially batty, Partenheimer says. "I've got probably a week's worth left" of fine-tuning the synchronization, "and then we're done," he says. —Adam Pearson