DONALDSONVILLE - The Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development, Westwood, and Ascension Parish Government held an open house for the public regarding a roadway project coming to Donaldsonville.

The project revolves around the widening of La. Highway 1 and new traffic signal plans, with major changes happening around the Donaldsonville area.

Earlier this month, officials broke ground on the new Hyundai-POSCO Louisiana Steel plant coming to the Riverplex MegaPark.

Both CF Industries and Linde also plan to build plants at the complex.

During Wednesday’s open house, DOTD told WBRZ that the widening project will help the new plants coming to the Riverplex.

"Yes, this project to four-lane LA 1 is to help service all the anticipated construction vehicles, the plant workers, everything that's going to be coming with the Riverplex development that is being constructed,” DOTD’s Critical Projects Division’s Kurt Brauner said.

With the new project, Donaldsonville will see the main road through the city, La. Highway 1, widened to four lanes from South Donaldsonville all the way to La. Highway 405 near Modeste.

"With all the new infrastructure coming in, it's important to be able to reduce the traffic. It'll be a nightmare without it, and being able to have four lanes is going to be able to open up everything, especially with all the signal retiming;” Westwood Project Manager Brandon Garcia said. “We're going to be retiming all the lights and widening the areas in between to make sure that we have four lanes going that whole stretch."

DOTD says that it’s just one of several infrastructure projects in the area that are going to be servicing the new development.

"It's roads, bridges, rail; there's a lot of moving parts here that are all going to come together and hopefully make a good project,” Brauner said.

Construction is expected to start in the first quarter of 2027.

According to pamphlets provided at the open house, construction phase one will feature four-laning La. Highway 1 from South Donaldsonville to La. Highway 405.

It will also include adding a new traffic signal and left-turn lane at the La. Highway 1 and La. Highway 405 junction.

Officials say they’ll finish phase one in late 2027, with phase two in 2028. Phase two will be from Barcelona Dr. To La. Highway 405.