NOLA History: Lakeshore Drive along Lake Pontchartrain

While Labor Day Weekend is the “official” end of the summer season for most of the United States, our weather in New Orleans allows us to stretch summer out just a bit longer.  Local families and visitors alike take advantage of the cooling weather to enjoy a day out along Lake Pontchartrain.

For decades, New Orleanians got out to the lakefront by either steam train or streetcar. In the 1930s, the WPA took on the project of building a concrete seawall along the south shore, and putting a roadway just behind it. You can see the steps of the seawall in this 1958 aerial photo by Leon Trice. West End and the marinas are at the bottom of the photo, then comes the Lakeshore neighborhood. The Marconi Canal separates Lakeshore from Lake Vista, which is designed to radiate out from a central community/shopping area. Next is Bayou St. John, then the Lake Terrace neighborhood. Then comes the London Avenue Canal, then the remnants of NAS New Orleans. You can still see the runways of the air base, which had just begun the conversion to what is now the University of New Orleans when this photo was shot.

Lakeshore, Lake Vista, Lake Terrace, along with Lake Oaks (in-between UNO’s Main and East campuses) are the four “Levee Board Subdivisions.” The Orleans Levee Board undertook a massive land reclamation project in the 1930s, extending the shoreline of the lake to what is now Lakeshore Drive. The reclaimed land was subdivided for residential use, and continues to be some of the most popular (and pricey) areas of the city in which to live.

When Lakeshore Drive was constructed, three shelter facilities were also built. This is “Shelter No. 1,” located between West End Boulevard and Canal Boulevard. The shelter buildings offer additional parking, restrooms, and concession stands to folks enjoying the lake.

Swimming in Lake Pontchartrain was always a popular way to cool off in the summer, but the only area where lifeguards were assigned was near Shelter No. 3, next to Bayou St. John. Shelter No. 3 is located roughly where the old Spanish Fort amusement area was at the turn of the 19th-20th centuries. Environmental concerns, most notably pollution being dumped in the lake by other cities, prompted the closure of the lake to swimmers in the 1980s, but a concerted effort by the Lake Pontchartrain Basin Foundation and the Orleans Levee Board to improve the water quality of the lake allowed it to be re-opened for swimming by the late 1990s.

One of the most popular picnic spots on Lakeshore Drive is the Mardi Gras Fountain, shown above. Constructed in 1961 by the Orleans Levee Board(OLB), the Mardi Gras Fountain features plaques depicting the crests of many Carnival krewes and organizations. Those plaques were designed by “Mr. Mardi Gras,” Blaine Kern. The Mardi Gras Fountain had just been renovated and re-dedicated in May, 2005, when it was severely damaged in the storm. The OLB hopes to restore the fountain in the future.

Lakeshore Drive is one of the best-maintained streets in the city. Here’s a crew re-paving the street in 1962. Most of Lakeshore Drive is “outside” of the lakefront’s flood protection system; the main levee runs about a hundred yards south of the street. Lakeshore Drive has some limited use as a commuter route to the University of New Orleans, but otherwise is a leisure/recreational boulevard. The OLB close two-way traffic on the street on weekends, so that traffic flows from West End to Bayou St. John just eastbound. The westbound lanes are open for bicyclists, skaters, and provide a buffer area for pedestrians near the seawall. In the 1980s, a section of Lakeshore Drive near UNO was “straightened out,” and the original “dead man’s curve” section of the street was converted to parking and picnic space.

New Orleans is as linked to Lake Pontchartrain as much as we are to the Mississippi River. The lake is at once our biggest threat and one of our greatest pleasures. Like everything here, we’re good at letting the good times roll on the lakefront.

Edward Branley is the author of New Orleans: The Canal Streetcar Line, and Brothers of the Sacred Heart in New Orleans, both books in Arcadia Publishing’s Images of America series.

photos courtesy of the New Orleans Public Library and the Orleans Parish Levee District

Tagged as: GoNOLA, Lake Pontchartrain, New Orleans, Orleans Levee Board