73°
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
7 Day Forecast
Follow our weather team on social media

The Water Campus breaks ground on key tenant

8 years 4 months 2 weeks ago Friday, November 13 2015 Nov 13, 2015 November 13, 2015 5:48 PM November 13, 2015 in News
Source: WBRZ
By: Russell Jones & Troy Gaulden

BATON ROUGE - State and local leaders officially broke ground on the next phase of construction for Baton Rouge's new Water Campus Friday morning.

Governor Bobby Jindal was at the groundbreaking for the $20 million Water Institute of the Gulf Research and Conference Center. The building, called TWIG, will be a headquarters for the nonprofit research group which will works to stop wetlands from receding.

"It's huge for us, because one of the visions for the water institute was that it would be a central focus for the water campus when it came along," said Water Institute of the Gulf President Chip Groat. "To see this building actually having groundbreaking today ready for construction is really a big event for us."

The project at the Old Baton Rouge Dock just south of the I-10 Mississippi River Bridge is part of $55 million in construction happening in the stretch of land south of I-10 between River Road and Nicholson Drive. The finished 33-acre campus will conduct research on the Mississippi River and Gulf Coast, with room for an estimated 4,000 scientists, researchers and engineers.

Work has already begun on the River Modeling Center which will hold a scale model of the Mississippi River for researchers to use and the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority next door.

Louisiana Economic Development predicted that by 2030, the water management sector could add 10,000 to 20,000 direct jobs and around the same number of indirect jobs to the region.

Related Stories

More News

Desktop News

Click to open Continuous News in a sidebar that updates in real-time.
Radar
7 Days