1012 Corridor

What’s not to love about life along the 10/12 corridor? Well, traffic, for one thing. The ever-shifting five-day hurricane forecast, for another. And not being able to get a table at Dakota’s on a Saturday night ain’t so hot, either. But for every complaint we have about living on the fast lane, there are a dozen or more passions that keep us here. The chance for pretty much anybody to make it big in business. Baton Rouge High School and Pontchartrain Elementary School. Summers at Big Lake and Grand Isle. Tailgating at Tiger Stadium. Saturdays at the ballpark. Politicians way more entertaining than those late night shows on the FX channel. That really cool virtual reality thing in Lafayette. Ballet and international guitars at the Columbia Theatre and Shaw Center. And the fact that 2.3 million people or not, this really is just one big small town. How do we love thee, corridor? Let us count but a few of the ways:

1. We have a fortune. Three, actually.

The 10/12 corridor is home to not one, not two, but three Fortune 1000 firms. Highest on the list at No. 426 is The Shaw Group—makers of … well … all things. It started out just two decades ago as a Baton Rouge fabrication shop, founded by Jim Bernhard Jr. and two colleagues. Today, it is an engineering, construction, technology, fabrication, environmental and industrial services business with 27,000 employees around the world. Last year, revenues topped $5.7 billion, with a $16.4 billion backlog. This summer, the company and Westinghouse Electric announced they’re building a facility on 300 acres at the Port of Lake Charles to make and assemble modules for Westinghouse’s nuclear power plants. At the same time, the company revealed it had reached an incentive package agreement with Louisiana to ensure its corporate headquarters remain in Baton Rouge.

Next on the list at No. 806 is new recruit Albemarle Corporation. This summer, the specialty chemical company with $2.3 billion in earnings moved its corporate headquarters from Richmond, Va., to the Capital City. It was a huge coup that economic development authorities dubbed “Project Home Run,” for it also secured the firms existing research laboratory, administrative offices and 600 jobs. So what made ’em decide to stick around? When Gov. Bobby Jindal took office, he enacted an ethics reform package and did away with a host of unpopular business taxes. But it didn’t hurt that the state pulled together a $7 million incentive package, either. “In the world of economic development, nothing is more exciting than landing a major corporate headquarters—especially a Fortune 1000 company,” says Louisiana Economic Development Secretary Stephen Moret. “This is definitely a home run.”

Finally, the corridor is also home to Pool Corp., No. 911 on Fortune’s ranking. Right here in the charming town of Covington sits the world’s largest wholesale distributor of swimming pool supplies, equipment and other leisure products. The company took a hit from the downturn in the housing market when income dropped 27%, but kept on going. This summer, Pool Corp.’s stock made JPMorgan’s Focus List of preferred investments because it was expected to rise 43% over an 18-month period.

2. We’re not afraid to fry

How do we eat our shrimp and crab and catfish and chicken and cheese and even vegetables like eggplant and okra? Fried, please. And by the platter. And if you don’t mind, wrap it up in some bacon. Fry that, too. Put it on a loaf of French bread and we’ll call it a sandwich. Just don’t forget to throw some Cajun fries on the side. The anti-transfat movement was afraid to come this far south, and with good reason.

3. We have a million ways to eat crawfish.

What can be so versatile as to go from mud hole to meunière sauce? Crawfish, of course. Sure, you can boil ‘em live with some potatoes and corn and start pinching. But Pujo Street Café in Lake Charles pairs them with shrimp and crabmeat in a spicy lemon butter sauce over Angel Hair pasta with two red crab claws in its Seafood Piccata. Or it lightly breads and fries them and lays them in a bed of spinach, roma tomatoes and red onion rings flavored with Honey Dijon dressing. Prejean’s in Lafayette puts them in enchiladas, bisque, and, the piece de resistance: the Crawfish Festival Platter. Get a taste of fried crawfish, crawfish etouffee, crawfish pie, crawfish boulettes, crawfish bisque and a fried crawfish salad on the side all for twenty bucks. Jubans in Baton Rouge serves it up over a blackened tilapia filet with mushrooms and green onions in a meunière sauce and stuffs them inside flash-fried jumbo shrimp, along with crabmeat and more shrimp. Look for them as well inside a crêpe topped with brie, boursin, parmesan, havarti or bordelaise sauce. Still haven’t had enough? Dakota Restaurant in Covington has a tasty little crawfish beignet.

4. Happy days are still here.

What’s that, you say? Something about a national recession and housing slump? Can’t hear very well over the circular saws and nail guns. In fact, economist Loren Scott forecasts billions of dollars worth of construction projects and thousands of jobs along the corridor over the next two years, thanks to the post-Katrina and post-Rita growth and GoZone. What’s to build? The $350 million low-sulfur diesel refinery for ExxonMobil in Baton Rouge. The $1 billion gasification plant in Lake Charles. The $900 million, 400-acre office, retail, residential and medical facility development known as The Summit in St. Tammany. And the list goes on.

5. We have the power.

Nearly one fourth of the state’s entire population and 48% of the representation in the Louisiana Legislature live along the original 10/12 corridor. Add the New Orleans region, as the corridor coalition now is wont to do, and what do you have? The power. Now if they could just all get along…

6. Two words: Death Valley.

When packed in purple and gold on game day, it’s the sixth-largest city in Louisiana. And quite possibly the loudest. “Welcome to Death Valley,” reads a sign mounted below the press box—a touch ESPN.com columnist Jim Caple once likened to descending into Hell and finding a banner that reads, “Satan Invites You to Enjoy Eternal Damnation.” Walking into the fourth largest on-campus college football stadium in the country is a bit like stepping into the Roman Coliseum, complete with roaring Bengal tiger. It wasn’t always this way. Lore has it the original nickname was “Deaf Valley,” which, over the years morphed into the way-more-menacing “Death Valley.” It’s had its moments as both. Exactly 20 years ago [October 8, 1988], Tommy Hodson threw to Eddie Fuller the winning touchdown against Auburn, and the explosion in the crowd was so deafening, a tremor registered on a seismograph in the university’s Department of Geology & Geophysics across campus. In last year’s game against the University of Florida, CBS recorded 129.8 decibels—roughly the level that causes pain, and strikes fear in the hearts of opposing teams. Former Southern California All-American Brad Budde once had this to say about it: “That place makes Notre Dame look like Romper Room.” And famed Alabama head coach Bear Bryant once remarked that it was “the worst place in the world for a visiting team. It’s like being inside a drum.”

7. We go on.

Hurricanes Katrina and Rita knocked us down and we’re still putting the pieces back together, but hopefully better than before. Lessons learned, we were ready for Gustav, evacuating thousands way before the storm arrived and, for the most part, and sparing ourselves the spectacle of clueless elected officials. The only exception: Our obviously overly vulnerable power system. Are you listening, Entergy?

8. We’re huge techies.

One would think you’d have to go to Austin, L.A. or Raleigh Durham to find things like a 3-D immersive visualization and high-performance computing resource center, an optic network connecting supercomputers and a gravitational wave observatory.

But here they are, right on the corridor.

The Louisiana Immersive Technologies Enterprise at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette lets developer can stroll through every space in his multi-million-dollar mall and make changes in color, dimensions and placement before the first concrete is ever poured.

The high-speed fiber optic network known as LONI connects supercomputers at LSU, ULL, Southern University and is one of the most advanced optical networks in the country.

And the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave Observatory in Livingston Parish detects and measures ripples in the fabric of space and time that are produced by violent events in the distant universe, such as the collision of black holes or shockwaves from supernova explosions.

9. The mom and pops still rule.

Sure, we’ve got the Fortune 1000s, multinational corporations and all the big chains along the corridor. But we’ve still got the mom and pops, too. Long before the corridor was four lanes [think back to 1876] and Target popped up at all the key exits, H.J. Smith’n Sons General Store was selling house wares in Covington. And it still does.

10. Despite what they say about us, we’ve got class.

We don’t have to go to Texas to view the Mari and James A. Michener collection. We don’t have to fly to New York City to see a great ballet. And we can watch movies under the stars. From the Columbia Theater in Hammond to the 100-seat amphitheater at Prien Lake Park in Lake Charles [and the Manship Theater in Baton Rouge in between], there’s high art close to home.

11. Our politicians are more entertaining than the FX Channel.

Heard about the Livingston Parish councilman who was arrested after getting into a pipe-vs.-copper-wire brawl with a passing motorist who saluted him with an unflattering hand gesture [A.C. “Buddy” Mincey]? Or the former state representative who, while running for reelection, said, “Talk to you later, Buckwheat!” to the mother of the local NAACP leader, not long after hitting a pedestrian with her vehicle [Carla Dartez]? And how about that former governor, a Crowley native, who’s still sitting behind bars for extortion [Edwin Edwards]? Sure, you have. Our politicians sometimes shame us, but they always entertain us.

12. We’ve got stars.

Author Ernest Gaines. Academy Award-winning director Steven Soderbergh. Ubiquitous talking head James Carville. Fame has not overlooked the corridor.

13. You can make millions from butt paste.

Boudreaux’s Butt Paste was originally developed in the 1970s by Louisiana pediatrician “Pappy” Talbot, but it was Covington pharmacist Dr. George Boudreaux who compounded the main formula [zinc oxide, Peruvian balsam, boric acid, castor oil and mineral oil in a wax and petroleum base]. Doctors would send patients to the pharmacy, saying, “Go see George. He’s got a really good butt paste.” The product was a local hit, and in 1994, Boudreaux sold his pharmacy, bought an RV he named the “Butt Mobile,” and hit the road marketing the paste. Sales took off in Walmart, and the rest is history. But Butt Paste isn’t just for babies anymore. These days, it’s used to treat everything from jock itch to chapped lips. It’s but one example of the entrepreneurial spirit that pervades the corridor.

14. Location, location, location!

“I can get to downtown New Orleans in 45 minutes for a Hornets or Saints game. I can get to Baton Rouge to visit friends in an hour. I can walk for exercise on the lakefront in Mandeville or on their pier after a dinner date with my husband. We can ride bikes on the Tammany Trace any time of the year, enjoy dinner overlooking the Tchefunte River or Lake Pontchartrain or the Mississippi River. We have a unique history and a more promising future. We have our beautiful towns and great cities along the corridor and can take overnight or day trips easily to enjoy shopping the downtowns, our fabulous festivals, weekend art shows or bed and breakfasts. I love where I live!” –Lacey Toledano, St. Tammany West Chamber of Commerce

15. The gators and alpacas and camels … oh my!

Only on the corridor can you get eye-to-eye with giraffes, feel the wooly fur of a bison, wiggle a camel’s hump, point and laugh at an alpaca and help hatch a baby alligator. Places like the Global Wildlife Center, Insta-Gator Ranch & Hatchery and private farms make it happen.

16. We really swing.

Those with a serious predilection for riding around in a battery-operated car, whacking a dimpled ball and eating a high-priced hot dog after nine holes have no problem getting their fix. Even as the popularity of golf is on the wane, the corridor has dozens of courses. It’s also home to seven of the 12 locations on the Audubon Golf Trail, many of which are nationally ranked: Gray Plantation in Lake Charles, The Island at Plaquemine, Audubon Park in New Orleans, TPC Louisiana in Avondale, Atchafalaya at Idlewood, Carter Plantation in Springfield and the Westlands in Lafayette.

17. It’s Hollywood South.

By the end of the year, Louisiana will have 222 films to its credit all made within a five-year period. That doesn’t count television programs, documentaries and other entertainment productions. The corridor in particular has seen a business boom, with Bullet Films and Active Entertainment in Lafayette, Celtic Media Center and Louisiana Media Services in Baton Rouge, and movie and television productions filming in Lake Charles, Hammond and Covington. Louisiana Film & Television now has an extensive online database of small- and big-screen experts along 10/12, from location scouts to acting coaches.

18. Smart kids.

We know the reputation Louisiana has for education. But corridor schools routinely rise above. Half of the 50 top-ranked schools in the state are along the 10/12 corridor. At the top of that list is Baton Rouge High School, which this year graduated Maya Bretzius, who earned a perfect score on the SAT, and Danny Ryan, who earned a perfect score on the ACT. What are the odds of that? We’re certain one of them could tell us. But we do know this much: only a few hundred students nationwide have those kind of bragging rights.