A new streamlined bus corridor connecting north and south Baton Rouge is expected to open late this year after facing construction delays.

BRapid, a rapid-response transit system created through a collaboration between the Capital Area Transit System and traffic mitigation initiative MovEBR, aims to make transportation to the Central Business District faster by providing a straightforward route along Plank and Nicholson roads.

“We talk about ‘how do we take mass transit in the capital city and make it more efficient?,'” Metro Council member Darryl Hurst said. “Because we don't have a railway, we don't have park and rides or anything of that nature, HOV lanes, we have to think outside of the box.”

Construction was initially expected to finish in 2024 after years of development that began in 2021, but the existing infrastructure required ownership transfers, and the plan ultimately underwent a full redesign for key sections along the proposed route. Now, construction is expected to finish in October, with services slated to start in December.

The $53 million route will have around 24 stops along Plank and Nicholson roads before ending near LSU’s campus on North Stadium Drive. To handle bus transit on Plank Road, the corridor had to be completely overhauled, repaving parts of the street, adding sidewalks, new stops and raising curbs to be level with the buses.

“We hadn't had a problem with the contractor,” city transportation and drainage director Fred Raiford said. “He's done a very good job, even with some things that we had to do changes with. They have done an exceptional job getting that done in a timely fashion.”

DOTD has finished the road work, and now just the bus stops need to be built, Raiford said.

The new stops will be elevated to reduce the time buses need to lower for passengers to board, bringing the 45-minute route time down to 30 minutes. The stops will be well-lit with real-time route boards, and the buses will have traffic-signal priority to further shorten transit time.

One setback the city is facing is bus stop vandalism, which causes workers to return to already finished sites before moving on to uncompleted areas, adding to delays and forcing the city to wait for replacement parts to arrive, Raiford said.

“Those things are very expensive; it takes a good bit of time to get some of the material back in to accomplish getting it ready to open,” Raiford said.

Along with the street improvements, additional sidewalks have been added along the side streets for riders walking to catch the buses.

The route starts at the newly built transit center on Airline Highway, which has dealt with its own setbacks.

The North Transit center will be the hub for the new system, equipped with a park-and-ride lot, bathrooms, ticketing and bike racks among other things. It is 97% to 98% complete, according to CATS CEO Theo Richards, with technology such as cameras still needing installation.

However, the transit site's concrete must be redone due to cracks and safety concerns, project managers said at a CATS public meeting in June. CATS officials would not comment on pending litigation with the original contractor for the concrete.

Nine electric buses operated by CATS are ready to run the route, Richards said.

Hurst believes a bus system like BRapid will better connect the city and further its economic development.

“Major cities that do extremely well have great public transportation systems, and so what we're doing is starting to poke our head out and begin to reach out for potential in the area,” Hurst said. “I believe this is only the beginning.”

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