On Wednesday afternoon, a row of officials wielding shovels marked a fresh start for a long-beleaguered corner of the Bywater: the vacant federal Navy base on Poland Avenue.
Cameras clicked as city officials and developers gathered on Wednesday to break ground at the fenced-in base, formally known as Naval Support Activity-East Bank. Over the next several years, crews will create a “mixed-use campus” of retail and office space along with much-needed affordable housing.
“This groundbreaking marks an important step in putting long-idle public land back to work for New Orleans,” Mayor Helena Moreno said.
The base’s three six-story buildings emptied in 2011, when the Navy retired the base. The site was handed over to the city two years later. Since then, its structures have sat empty as its windows were broken out and walls graffitied. It became home to many squatters and was the site of at least one shootout.
Construction will be done in three phases, according to a presentation prepared for the Bywater Neighborhood Association in August, which shows not only shiny new apartments but gardens and courtyards brightening up the now-blighted space.
Affordable housing will allow more working families to live within the city, officials say
The redevelopment includes 294 units of affordable housing built over ground-floor retail. Most of the apartments, 220 of them, will have two bedrooms; with 49 one-bedrooms and 25 three-bedrooms. They will be priced as “workforce housing,” for families earning between 20% and 60% of what’s known as Area Median Income, which in 2025 ranges between $12,580 and $37,740 for a one-person household.
Seventy-four of the affordable units have Housing Authority of New Orleans vouchers tied to them, which are known as “project-based vouchers” (as opposed to HANO’s portable housing vouchers that can be used to help with rent at apartments across the city).
The second floor of one apartment building will also provide no-cost space to the city of New Orleans, according to the Bywater presentation. The use for that was unclear at press time: some proposals had suggested that first responders could be housed at the base during emergencies; others had suggested that the space be used for municipal office space.
Brian Gibbs Development will lead the base’s overall renovation. Co-developers include California-based affordable-housing developer Lincoln Avenue Communities, which just finished a highly regarded renovation of Tivoli Place, the six-story affordable development for seniors set on lower St. Charles Avenue near Harmony Circle (formerly Lee Circle).
Tech startup partnership is an anchor of new development
On Wednesday, officials emphasized one anchor of the new 22-acre campus — a public-private partnership of tech startups called Newlab New Orleans, which is described as “an innovation and technology hub designed to help startups and industry partners develop, test, and scale the critical technologies that will shape future industries in the State.”
Newlab will be built to house up to 35 tech companies and 100 individuals, according to the Bywater presentation. The public-private partnership that includes Louisiana Economic Development, the City of New Orleans, Future Use of Energy in Louisiana (FUEL), Louisiana State University, Greater New Orleans, Inc., and Shell.
Base built for Army in 1919
Built in 1919 for the U.S. Army, the base was sited on prime real estate, at the juncture of the Mississippi River and the then-new Industrial Canal. During World War II, it became a port of embarkation for Army soldiers deploying overseas; the base’s Quartermaster depot also became the Port of New Orleans’ largest shipper. In 1966, the U.S. Navy took it over and ran it until its closure.
Older Bywater neighbors spoke on Wednesday about the recordings of bugle calls played to start and end the day on the base. People coming and going from Poland Avenue created enough traffic that Royal Street – which heads to the French Quarter from the base – used to be nicely paved to accommodate them, they said.
After years of neglect, Royal Street is now ready for a new stream of workers heading to the Quarter and CBD — it was redone before the Super Bowl in January because of official events held along it.
