Baton Rouge officials gathered Friday for a groundbreaking ceremony along Glasgow Avenue, marking the start of a sidewalk safety project meant to give pedestrians, students, and library visitors a safer path along the avenue. The plan calls for 4,000 feet of new sidewalks running along both sides of the street, paired with crosswalks, handicap ramps, and drainage upgrades.
According to WBRZ, crews will also tackle longstanding drainage issues along the avenue by filling in roadside ditches and installing underground piping as part of the work. Officials say the combined sidewalk and drainage improvements are designed to make the area safer for pedestrians, students, and library visitors who rely on the corridor to get around.
A request for qualifications posted by the Baton Rouge City-Parish Department of Public Works Projects Website: RFQ Manager outlines the scope of the work, describing sidewalk improvements running from Hyacinth Avenue to Perkins Road. The document calls for designing new sidewalks along both sides of the street and installing storm drains as necessary, matching the broader drainage goals described at Friday's ceremony.
Right-of-Way Details Still Filed Locally
A project page maintained by MOVEBR notes that any final official right-of-way maps tied to work near Glasgow Middle are those filed and available through the East Baton Rouge Clerk of Courts Office. The page does not spell out specific property impacts beyond pointing residents to that record-keeping arrangement.
The Glasgow Avenue groundbreaking comes as crash data has drawn fresh attention to pedestrian safety across the parish. WBRZ has reported that the total number of pedestrians, bicyclists, and motorcyclists involved in fatal or severe crashes so far in 2026 is higher than it was at the same point in 2025. The same report cited LSU's Center for Analytics and Research in Transportation Safety, which ranked East Baton Rouge Parish second only to Orleans Parish in pedestrian and bicyclist crash deaths last year.
Nationally, the scale of the problem is larger still. The report noted that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration says more than 7,000 pedestrians were killed in U.S. traffic crashes in 2024, with more than 70,000 injured.
Part of a Broader Accessibility Push
Glasgow Avenue's groundbreaking follows a string of other infrastructure efforts across the parish aimed at closing accessibility gaps. WBRZ has reported that MOVEBR addressed 2,693 ADA non-compliance issues and improved access at 192 intersections throughout East Baton Rouge Parish, part of a broader effort that also added more than 900 ADA-compliant ramps and repaired 31,431 square yards of sidewalk.
That accessibility push has included a $10 million MOVEBR project to transform sidewalks, pathways, ramps, and crosswalks across 21 areas of the parish, as previously reported by WAFB. As part of that effort, a stretch of North Boulevard in downtown Baton Rouge was under construction with an expected wrap-up in March, the station reported.
Local and state leaders also broke ground in May on an $8 million improvement project along a Scotlandville corridor, according to WAFB. That project includes redoing the roadway, improving sidewalks and traffic signals, and adding gates to a railroad crossing.
