Exclusive – Planned new barriers on Bourbon Street in New Orleans may only collapse at 10 mph Reuters

Brian Thevenot and Chris Kirkham

NEW ORLEANS (Reuters) – Months before the deadly New Orleans New Year’s Eve vehicle attack, the city modeled scenarios in which a gunman could enter Bourbon Street at various intersections in a Ford (NYSE: ) F-150 cab similar to one that once killed 14 people and injured dozens more.

Engineers found that such a pickup truck could enter a busy tourist route at speeds ranging from 12 to 70 mph — yet city officials are now installing new street barriers that can only withstand impacts of 10 mph, according to an engineering analysis commissioned by the city in April and city bidding documents reviewed by Reuters.

Those new barriers, known as “cleats,” had not yet been installed on Bourbon Street on New Year’s Day, but are scheduled to be completed by the NFL Super Bowl on Feb. 9 in New Orleans. Documents reviewed by Reuters, which have not been previously published, make clear that the system will not be able to prevent vehicle attacks at moderate to high speeds.

In selecting the new bollard system, the city prioritized ease of operation over the impact resistance of the new bollard system because of chronic performance issues with the old one, according to documents and a source with direct knowledge of the city’s Bourbon Street safety planning. Unlike some pedestrian-only zones, such as New York’s Times Square, Bourbon Street is open to regular vehicular traffic for most of the day, forcing city officials to block off parts of it from surrounding streets each evening.

Since the New Year’s Day attack, New Orleans officials have faced scrutiny over whether citizens were vulnerable as crews removed old bollards and installed new ones. But neither barrier system would have prevented the deadly attack, according to the source and a Reuters review of city documents.

The city currently has no stops at Canal and Bourbon streets, where the gunman entered, but the road was blocked by an SUV police car parked sideways on New Year’s Day.

The suspect in the attack, Shamsud-Din Jabbar, a US war veteran from Texas, exploited another vulnerability in the city’s security planning: He wedged his seven-foot-wide pickup truck on the eight-foot-wide sidewalk between the drugstore wall and a police car, stomping on the gas and weaving his way through the crowd. around 3:15 am

Jabbar died after the attack in a shootout with police. Federal authorities said he was radicalized and pledged allegiance to the Islamic State militant group.

The city’s safety modeling, in an engineering study conducted to help select the new barrier system, only considered scenarios where a vehicle entered Bourbon Street onto the pavement — not the sidewalk. The vehicle could not enter most of the Bourbon blocks on their thin sidewalks, which have other existing barriers such as fire hydrants or balcony and street light poles, the source said.

City officials would face “difficult meetings” about the ongoing vulnerabilities of the new poles being installed now, the person said, which would “make no difference” on New Year’s Day.

New Orleans city officials did not respond to detailed questions from Reuters about their safety planning on Bourbon Street and the decision to choose barriers with a crash rating of 10 mph.

A person with direct knowledge of urban safety planning highlighted the difficulties all cities face in protecting against vehicular attacks while maintaining access to routine vehicular and pedestrian traffic, including accessible sidewalks for people with disabilities.

The source said officials selected a 10 mph impact bollard system from a company called 1-800-Bollards Inc. The city’s bid documents, dated in August and September, called for an installer of the system, calling it a “removable bollard RCS8040 S10.” A city engineering analysis in April describes the same product as an “S10” crash rating and explains that it can stop a 5,000-pound vehicle traveling 10 mph.

“Crash ratings are listed as S10 (10mph impact), S20 (20mph impact) and S30 (30mph impact),” according to the engineering analysis.

The source said a barrier rated for 10 mph impacts can still slow or significantly damage a vehicle traveling faster.

Representatives for 1-800-Bollards Inc declined to comment.

Two Bourbon Street attack scenarios modeled by city-hired engineers involved entering the street in a straight line, without turning, after increasing speed.

The study found that the 2015 F-150 can reach 50 mph accelerating from a traffic light across Canal Street, a wide boulevard with streetcar tracks down the middle. The same vehicle could hit 70 mph entering from the opposite end of the bollard-protected section of Bourbon Street.

Jabbar drove a more lethal weapon than the truck used in the report’s scenarios – the newer F-150 Lightning, a much faster, heavier and quieter electric vehicle.

During large events such as New Year’s or Mardi Gras, the source said, the city’s security plans call for large vehicles to be parked on the ends of Bourbon Street that are most vulnerable to attacks by speeding vehicles. But such measures, the person said, are not practical on a daily basis in a crowded tourist zone.

‘BOURBON STREET JUICE’

Since at least 2020, city officials have been studying how best to replace New Orleans’ failing system of street barriers to protect against vehicle attacks, the source said.

The city installed its first bollard system after coming under pressure from federal officials in 2017 to protect Bourbon Street following a spate of vehicle attacks around the world, including one in 2016 that killed 86 people and injured hundreds in Nice, France.

New Orleans initially selected a system called the Heald HT2 Matador that allowed workers to move the barriers into place along rails on the street, according to city documents. A source told Reuters the system was chosen in large part because the federal government had already bid and priced it, allowing the city to install it more quickly.

But the barriers proved problematic under the rigors of Bourbon Street — and often inoperative as the lanes were clogged with trash including Mardi Gras bead necklaces.

In addition, the barrier’s locking and unlocking mechanism was built into the street and was often submerged in what a source called “Bourbon Street juice” — a mixture of street grime, trash, rainwater, spilled drinks and the occasional vomit that robs tourists of its signature smell.

“You have to dip your hand in Bourbon Street juice to unlock it,” the person said. “It was a disgusting job. You couldn’t get anybody to do that.”

Heald, the manufacturer of the bollards, said in a statement that they had not been moved into place to block Bourbon Street before the attack, “and therefore were not malfunctioning.”

The system works efficiently, the company said, with “basic maintenance and cleaning.”

LIGHT WEIGHT BATTLES

Because of those issues, the city prioritized factors including ease of operation and maintenance over crash safety ratings when selecting the new system, according to the source and an April 2024 report by Mott MacDonald, an engineering firm hired by the city to evaluate the dozens of pole options.

Representatives of Mott MacDonald did not comment.

The report lists three different crash rating standards for poles. It concluded that the highest crash rating, which could withstand impacts from 15,000-pound vehicles traveling at 30 to 50 mph, was “not compatible” with the city’s need to move poles every day.

“Specialized lifting equipment such as a truck-mounted crane or heavy machinery would be required” to move such poles on a daily basis, the report said.

The city chose the 10 mph-rated 1-800-Bollards Inc. system, relatively lightweight stainless steel bollards that sink into street foundations, in part because the bollards could be installed and removed daily by one city employee, the source said. Those poles weigh 44 pounds, the engineering analysis says, while similar 20-mph poles weigh 86 pounds.

The same report included modeling attack scenarios. Along with those showing potential speeds of 50 mph and 70 mph, all other scenarios show the F-150 can turn onto Bourbon at between 12 mph and 20 mph without hitting a curb or running onto the pavement—exceeding the system’s 10 mph crash rating that is chose the city.

The source said the primary concern of city officials, along with French Quarter residents and business representatives, was to protect pedestrians from vehicles turning onto Bourbon from side streets at slower speeds.

The report evaluated different systems according to different criteria. The system the city ultimately chose received a deduction in its “safety rating” because it “did not meet the stated project requirements.”

It received high marks for the weight of the cleats and their low cost.