Officials Announce New Hurricane Evacuation Procedures

I-55 Contraflow Traffic During Hurricane Gustav

Mississippi and Louisiana officials have announced new contraflow procedures for this year’s hurricane season. MPB’s Phoebe Judge has more.

The contraflow system was designed to help alleviate Louisiana’s evacuation problems in the event of a hurricane. The system when put in place turns all lanes Northbound on both Highway 59 and Highway 55. While the system has been used for both hurricanes Katrina and Gustav, Willie Huff with the Mississippi Department of Transportation says people should not rely on contraflow for their evacuations,

“Contraflow was designed to be the last resort to be to allow the maximum number of people to leave the flood prone areas in the shortest amount of time. It was not designed to be able to get people from New Orleans to Hattiesburg in two hours.”

New changes to the contraflow procedures this year will extend the contraflow route Northbound for an additional 31 miles on Highway 59, and include the intermittent closing of some exits along the route in an attempt to protect towns like Picayune and Poplarville from being overwhelmed with evacuees. Mississippi does not use contraflow procedures, and Steve Simpson Commissioner of Mississippi’s Department of Public Safety acknowledges that it can cause headaches,

“It is an inconvenience. It does cause congestion on the Mississippi roads. But when you have a storm like a Katrina, or a Gustav bearing down on the low lying areas of south Louisiana everyone is understanding of the evacuation routes.”

This year Mississippi citizens will be able to use the Department of Transportations’ Twitter site to monitor traffic situations on all the state’s evacuation routes.