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A section of St. Charles Avenue through the Garden District will close overnight Tuesday for repaving work, and police will guide traffic on a detour to either Prytania Street or South Claiborne Avenue, New Orleans city officials said. For details, see the news release below. The City of New Orleans construction contractor, Boh Bros. Construction, LLC, will detour traffic on St.
A man driving a motorcycle was killed Sunday evening in a crash on Audubon Street, New Orleans police said. Around 8:45 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 3, an SUV driving on Fig Street made a right turn onto the 2900 block of Audubon Street, according to NOPD reports. “The driver of the SUV states he stopped at the intersection, looked both ways, and proceeded into the intersection once all lanes of traffic were clear,” according to the initial NOPD report. A Suzuki GSXR 750 motorcycle “traveling at a high rate of speed” came up Audubon from behind the SUV, however, and hit its driver’s side rear tire, the report states.
A request to rezone two properties at Jackson Avenue and Laurel Street to allow them to become legal short-term rentals passed the City Council last week, but only after a heated discussion about the ongoing impact of AirBnB-type vacation rentals on the city’s housing stock. The rezoning applies to the house at 839 Jackson Avenue and wraps around to an adjacent building at 2130 Laurel Street, according to city documents. The owner and developer, Cornelius Payne, sought to rezone the property from residential to a neighborhood business classification, proposing two units in the Jackson Avenue home and two smaller units in the Laurel Street building. Part of the property already had the business zoning, but Payne needed that business zoning consistent across the property partly in order to host short-term rentals there, city documents state. City planners had recommended allowing the zoning change for the building fronting on Jackson Avenue, but denying it for the Laurel Street property.
A man was wounded in a shooting on St. Andrew Street on Thursday evening, after a woman was robbed of her cell phone on Chestnut Street and a man was carjacked on South Broad Street earlier that day. The shooting took place around 7 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 31, in the 2700 block of St. Andrew Street, according to the initial NOPD report.
The entire field of candidates for the open District B seat on the City Council support the removal of both red-light cameras and Confederate monuments, and also reacted to one candidate’s admission of a past opioid addiction in a recent televised debate. Like in District A a week earlier, the WDSU “hot seat” debate moderated by Travers Mackel covered a lot of ground with the District B candidates in a short time. Unlike the District A debate, however, the 20-minute segment did less to highlight differences between the candidates and more to put them on the record on areas of shared agreement. All six candidates for the seat — Jay H. Banks, Eugene Ben, Seth Bloom, Catherine Love, Timothy David Ray and Andre Strumer — said they oppose the use of red-light traffic cameras to generate ticket revenue in what Mackels posed as a yes-or-no question. “I would support taking them down immediately,” Strumer said.
A woman in her 70s was robbed of her bags Wednesday evening on Camp Street near Lee Circle, New Orleans police said. The victim was in the 1000 block of Camp Street (near Andrew Higgins Drive) around 7:45 p.m. when a stranger grabbed two bags out of hands and fled with them, according to the initial NOPD report. Further details were not immediately available. Anyone with information is urged to call CrimeStoppers at 822-1111 to leave an anonymous tip that could be eligible for a cash reward.
The City Council gave final permission last week to a Central City church to rebuild its community center next door. The Third Rose of Sharon Baptist Church at 2132 Third Street needed a conditional use to build the community center. It had been a two-family home for much of the 20th Century, but was used as a community center before Katrina, and the lot has been vacant since the building was demolished in 2007. “The center will provide after-school programming, meals, and access to computers and internet for residents of the area,” the City Planning report states. The city planning staff had initially recommended against the land-use change, saying the center wouldn’t bring any more impact on the neighborhood than the church already does, but the vacant 3,800-square foot lot itself was smaller than normally required for a free-standing community center.
A traffic stop Tuesday on Milan Street led officers to the discovery of marijuana, a handgun and a roll of cash, New Orleans police said. Rene Washington, 24, was driving in the 3200 block of Milan Street on around 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 29, when NOPD Second District officers stopped him, according to a police report. “The driver of the vehicle, later identified as Washington, was found to have in his possession marijuana, as well as a digital scale, cash and a fully loaded hand gun,” the report states. Washington was arrested on charges of possessing marijuana with the intent to distribute it and while carrying a gun.
After a surprise day off Tuesday for Tropical Storm Harvey’s rains, all students in the Orleans Parish School Board and Recovery School District will return to their schools as normal on Wednesday, officials announced. Most of New Orleans has received 3 to 4 inches of rain from Harvey as of Tuesday afternoon, though some areas have received as much as 5 to 6 inches, said Mayor Mitch Landrieu in a news conference. With another 3 or 4 inches expected overnight, the total this week is likely to be squarely within the 5 to 10 inches initially forecast for New Orleans by the National Weather Service, Landrieu said. “That prediction is right on track,” Landrieu said. The latest models show Harvey is expected to make its second landfall between Lake Charles, La., and Beaumont, Texas, overnight, then continue northward while weakening into a tropical depression Wednesday.
After rain bands from Tropical Storm Harvey brought nearly 6 inches of rain to New Orleans on Monday, city officials warned residents to stay off the streets if at all possible because of the continued threat of flooding with nearly several inches more rain expected Tuesday. The center of Harvey has moved back into the Gulf of Mexico off the Texas coast and is slowly moving northward, with a second landfall predicted around 7 a.m. Wednesday in Lake Charles, according to the National Weather Service. “Yesterday, the City experienced some localized flooding and received as much as 5.85 inches of rain at the Sewerage and Water Board (S&WB) pump station in New Orleans East,” according to a news release form the city. “Mayor Landrieu has advised residents to stay home and shelter in place today due to heavy rainfall and potential localized flooding associated with Harvey. “Heavy rainfall remains the primary concern for New Orleans, with 3 to 4 inches of rain forecasted for today.
