As of today, Monday, October 12, 2026, the timber trestle that carries the Tammany Trace over Bayou Castine is closed. It will stay closed through May 2027, and St. Tammany Parish says no detour will be available. The bridge sits between Rapatel Street and Group Camp Road, on the stretch of the Trace that leads from Mandeville toward Fontainebleau State Park. For the next seven months, the long flat ride from Lafitte Street to the park will end at the water.
A second Mandeville bridge has been out since August. With both closures in place, the Mandeville Trailhead at 675 Lafitte Street becomes the part of the Trace that still works the way it always has this season, and its fall calendar is full.
Four Closures on a 31-Mile Trail
The parish describes the Tammany Trace as a 31-mile corridor running from downtown Covington through Abita Springs, Mandeville and Lacombe to Slidell. This fall, four separate projects interrupt it. Two of them are in Mandeville.
| Bridge | Location | Closed | Expected back | Detour |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| #13, Bayou Castine | Rapatel Street to Group Camp Road, Mandeville | October 12, 2026 | May 2027 | None |
| #14, Bayou Castine tributary | Molitor Street to Dupre Street, Mandeville | August 17, 2026 | Early 2027 | Montgomery Street |
| #24 | 6th Street to Hickory Street, Abita Springs | September 9, 2026 | Early 2027 | Hickory Street to St. John Street to 6th Street |
| Abita River bridge | Gordon Avenue to the Abita Springs Trailhead | March 30, 2026 | End of 2026 | None listed |
Bridge #14 has the easier workaround. Trace users can leave the trail and use the parish's posted detour along Montgomery Street. Bridge #13 has none. Bayou Castine is the larger crossing, and there is no short street route posted around it.
The closures in Abita Springs matter to Mandeville riders too. A ride from Lafitte Street toward Abita Springs and Covington runs into the Abita River work. The parish lists the section from Gordon Avenue to the Abita Springs Trailhead as closed to all Trace users until the bridge replacement finishes, expected by the end of 2026. For the rest of this year, the Trace runs in separate segments.
Why the Timber Is Coming Out
Neither Mandeville bridge failed suddenly. The parish's 2024 capital budget lists both as timber trestles that were inspected in 2022 and found to be in very poor condition. On the Bayou Castine bridge, inspectors rated 100% of the deck, 100% of the cap supports and 63% of the 100 pile supports as poor or critical. On the tributary bridge, the share was 100% of the deck, 67% of the cap supports and 63% of its 35 piles. They also found termite activity in cap supports on both. The same document noted that both bridges were already closed to Trace maintenance vehicles. People on foot and bike were still using decking that had been ruled too weak for the parish's own service trucks.
The replacements change the material entirely. At Bayou Castine, the bid documents call for removing the timber bridge and installing a 255-foot prefabricated steel truss. The project also includes new concrete abutments and foundations, new decking and safety railings, and rebuilt trail approaches that tie into the existing corridor. At the tributary crossing, the listing describes an 85-foot pre-engineered steel-truss pedestrian bridge on pile-supported concrete abutments, plus new asphalt path, drainage and erosion-control work. That contract allows 240 calendar days from the notice to proceed.
The work is paid for out of the Trace's own capital fund. The parish lists that fund's sources as the Tammany Trace 2% sales tax district and its available fund balance. For Bayou Castine, the parish estimated the job at $2,138,228.30. Two bids came in when bids opened on June 10, 2026. Baker Pile Driving and Site Work, LLC bid $2,218,600.78, and Command Construction, LLC bid $3,388,888.10. The bid sheet does not say which bid won, and the bid listing notes that the award is subject to final approval.
The parish packet gives one more number for context. Bridge #12 over Cane Bayou was in similar condition in the same inspection cycle, and that budget listed it as awaiting funding for engineering design. The current Bayou Castine work is one piece of a longer effort to replace aging timber on the Trace.
What the Gap Changes
Louisiana State Parks lists Fontainebleau State Park at 62883 Highway 1089 in Mandeville and notes that the Tammany Trace runs through the park. That connection is what made the Trace the off-street way to reach the park's lakefront from town. With Bridge #13 closed and no parish detour, it is no longer possible to ride from the Trailhead to the park on the Trace. The same is true for the longer trip east toward Lacombe and Slidell.
The parish has posted no alternative bike or walking route to the park for the length of the closure, and the State Parks page does not offer one either. Without an official route, the honest answer for now is that the park still has its own Highway 1089 address and is still open as a destination. The trail link to it is what's missing until May.
That leaves the Trailhead as the fixed point. It sits on Lafitte Street in Old Mandeville, a short distance from the lakefront the city describes as a roughly one-mile passive park. The Trailhead's appeal never depended on how far the trail ran. This fall, its own schedule gives people reasons to come and stay.
The Lafitte Street Season
Last weekend set the tone. The Festival of the Lake ran October 9 through 11 at 312 Lafitte Street with free admission, and Marc Broussard played Saturday from 8 to 10 p.m. On the Monday after that weekend, the Bayou Castine bridge closed.
The Mandeville Trailhead Market continues Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 675 Lafitte Street, and the city calendar lists it every week through November 28, 2026. The city's free Friday concert series, Mandeville Live!, gathers at the Trailhead. The Dew Drop Jazz & Social Hall has its own run of shows on the same calendar.
The next five weeks, from the city's October and November calendars:
- Friday, October 23, 6:30 p.m. Mandeville Live! with Four Unplugged.
- Saturday, October 24, 4:30 p.m. Sunset Symphony with the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra.
- Saturday, October 24, 6:30 p.m. Dew Drop concert featuring Tom Worrell.
- Friday, October 30, 6:30 p.m. Mandeville Live! with Amanda Shaw.
- Friday, November 6, 6:30 p.m. Mandeville Live!
- Saturday, November 7, 6:30 p.m. Dew Drop concert with Stephanie Jordan.
- Friday, November 13, 6:30 p.m. Mandeville Live! with Soul Revival.
- Saturday, November 14, 6 p.m. Craig Klein Allstars and the Mandeville High Jazz Ensemble at the Dew Drop.
October 24 has the fullest schedule. The Louisiana Philharmonic's late-afternoon start and the 6:30 p.m. Dew Drop show mean one Saturday evening holds two concerts, about two hours apart.
The Trailhead also has a newer place to eat than most of these events. Country Roads reported that Carson's Table opened this past May on Lafitte Street at the foot of the Mandeville Trailhead. Chef and owner Carson Wandell cooks scratch-made, elevated Creole food. Its first fall falls during the same months the Bayou Castine crossing is closed, so the restaurant opens onto the stretch of trail still in use.
Through May
The dates are already posted. The Abita River section is expected back by the end of 2026, Bridge #14 and Bridge #24 in early 2027, and the Bayou Castine crossing in May 2027. When the 255-foot steel truss opens over Bayou Castine, the Trace link from Lafitte Street to Fontainebleau will run on steel instead of the timber trestle the parish rated very poor in 2022. The parish's Tammany Trace page is where closure windows get updated, and the city calendar covers everything on Lafitte Street in the meantime.
Every season, Jolita Burrell follows the small changes that shape daily life on the Northshore, from a trail bridge to a new restaurant at the Trailhead. If you have questions about Old Mandeville or the streets along the Trace, we would be glad to talk them through with you. Contact Us.
