Lousiana Town Wants Feds To Replace Sinking Highway At Key Oil Hub

PORT FOURCHON, Louisiana — "If you think oil is expensive now, just imagine if Hurricane Ivan had swung west and come ashore at this bustling oil and gas port at the southernmost point of Louisiana.

That's the message Port Fourchon is broadcasting as it tries to get the federal government to help fund a new bridge and elevated highway to ensure access to this isolated spot and make sure its precious commodities never get swamped. With 75 percent of the Gulf of Mexico's deep water oil and gas drilling supplied by Port Fourchon and 1.7 million barrels of oil a day coursing through pipelines under it, it is a queen bee when it comes to the nation's energy supply.

And port officials say a hurricane like Ivan would have knocked out this petroleum hub for a good long while. "If Ivan had been 100 miles west, my guestimate is that oil would cost $75 a barrel," Ted Falgout, the port's executive director, told congressional staffers on a recent visit. "What that would have done to the country; I'll let you do the math."

Right now, a two-lane highway — Louisiana Highway 1 — is the only roadway to Port Fourchon. The road is barely above sea level as it barrels south through the marsh. The port is asking for a $170 million federal loan to get construction started on a 73-foot-high bridge and 16-foot-high elevated highway from a point just south of the last levee out to the port. But those plans have run into trouble. Falgout said the federal government is unwilling to lend the money because of the uncertainty that traffic tolls to the port and Grand Isle, a nearby town, would ever pay off the loan."

EDIT

http://www.enn.com/today.html?id=295

And by the way, fuck the Port Fourchon school system, fuck the people ill with cancer from petroleum carcinogins and fuck the Gulf fishing industry.

Let them pray them away.

they don't want "federal funds" to exist............so the first step is to learn to live without them.