The twelve mile bridge, also known as the twelve mile parking lot! I lived in Laplace for many years. That bridge is between Metairie and Laplace with Metairie being a suburb of New Orleans. A trip to downtown New Orleans took between twenty minutes and two hours, unless there was a major wreck. Often a fender bender on one side and rubbernecking led to a fatality on the other side! I hated appointments in New Orleans!
Enough people had fishing poles that it was a common sight to see somebody fishing killing time waiting on the bridge to clear. This often meant traffic clearing enough that the emergency vehicles could come up the wrong side of the causeway bridge. Two turnarounds were added that helped a little and a new crossover shortened the twelve mile bridge to more like ten miles. I think there was already a ten mile on the other side of New Orleans along with the twin spans, Huey P Long bridge that Scotty Townsend jumped off of, a hundred and twenty or thirty feet jump, and still more bridges.
Laplace was the last place on the Mississippi River fit to build on, New Orleans and countless smaller towns and communities should never have existed as year around homes and businesses. In the the good ol' days the rich folks abandoned New Orleans to the flies and mosquitoes, disease and pestilence in the hot months. Fever was so bad that in the worst years wagons would pass every day picking up bodies to be burned.
For those interested in a few more wrecks, there are eagle's nests in the trees on both ends of the twelve mile bridge and bald eagles and ospreys are common sights. Leads to more rubbernecking of course!
End this with a chuckle: After a midlife career change brought on by an injury I was working in Harahan I think. Maybe Metairie, easy to confuse the many communities around the edges of New Orleans. Used to working outdoors after a day in the office I got lead footed just as I started onto the twelve mile. Speed limit was fifty five or sixty, seventy or seventy-five was the norm if you didn't want to block traffic. As I approached where the cops hid at the last entrance I realized in the first rush of freedom after being caged all day I was passing cars a bit fast. I glanced down to see my speedometer on ninety-five just as I got to where the cop could see me. Braking sharply I saw the cop jump onto the sled and catch the car in front of me! Optical Illusion, with me falling back rapidly he seemed to be the one flying! Sorry about that but better you than me.
Always pissed me off that the people going fifteen miles over the speed limit would jam on the brakes and go fifteen under when they saw a cop. Did they think the cop was going to average out their speed? Damned yankees that had never seen a South Louisiana rain shower were another irritation. Again going fifteen over then jamming down to a crawl when it started raining!
Fishing is better off of old 51 under I-55 and the shrimp run once in awhile too. People with simple dip or throw nets catch coolers full of big shrimp, sometimes several hundred pounds. Freshwater crawfish make great bait or supper too.
Lots of memories stirred up by that post and I could ramble for a few more pages! I won't start on the even longer parking lot near Rick, Whiskey Bay! When talking multi-vehicle pile ups in the fog on Whiskey Bay we may be talking about over 100 vehicles, four wheels to eighteen or more. Few things scarier than driving in that white out fog. Nothing to see past your hood. Do you drive fifty-sixty and fear piling into the back of some idiot driving thirty-five or do you slow to thirty-five and sweat some moron piling into the back of you?
My favorite memories of Whiskey Bay were the late night trips coming back from dirt tracking at the dirt track between Lafayette and Opelousas. Seventy-five or eighty was for the slow lane. The eighteen wheelers would start winding up coming out of Houston and would be topping a hundred loaded by the time the ones with governers tweaked hit Whiskey Bay. I decided I was ready to get home one morning after racing until three. I tried to tuck in and draft an eighteen wheeler loaded with oilfield equipment. My van with race car on back was feeling the strain at 100 and the truck was still pulling away!
When I was a teenager Whiskey Bay was the gateway to Breaux Bridge, Saint Martinsville, Lafayette and the surrounding area. Easy action on the pool tables to pay for partying with the most beautiful girls in the continental US. The girls in Hawaii give them a run for their money, nowhere else I have ever been though. Nothing touched the girls with a real cajun accent. Had to speak french before english to have that accent!
Guess I did talk about Whiskey Bay too! Easy to pass a good time in South Louisiana. A different world starts just above the I-10, I-12 line. Cajuns love to gamble and I suspect a young man or two with a stick could still make enough to spend a few weeks partying in Acadiana.
Hu