With renovations going on in old downtown Bossier City comes a lot of road work.

If you've driven down Barksdale Boulevard lately, you might notice it's blocked off as you get close to the Bossier Arts Council. In fact, beyond the barricades is a giant dirt pile -- a mud pit, when we get a good bit of rain.

Having spent time in the area recently, I can tell you it's difficult navitaging around the mess. If you want to go eat at L'Italiano, or check out the works hanging on the walls at the Bossier Arts Council, you have to park a little ways down the road and walk through the dirt and mud.

While it does look right now like someone dropped a bomb on the area, the end result is expected to be pretty amazing. The Bossier Re-visioning Plan calls for a festival plaza, a new skyline and bike paths, among other improvements.

City Project Coordinator Pam Glorioso told me businesses along that stretch of Barksdale are making the best out of the situation until the re-visioning project is complete. She said water and sewer work has already been done.

"New electrical is going in, as well," she said. "We have run areas for new fiber optics, to equip the area for WiFi. We're gearing up to bring it into the 21st century once again."

Glorioso said it's looking like everything's on track to be finished by this time next year, so we don't have long to wait.

"This is Bossier...we move fairly quick," Glorioso said. "We kicked this project off in April, with the hopes that we could get it completed by July, August of 2017."

CLICK HERE to take a look at the plans for downtown Bossier City.

 

Barksdale 1
Photo: Angela Thomas
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