BATON ROUGE — Months after a $2.5 million upgrade project along South Sherwood Forest Boulevard was intended to improve safety, pedestrian crosswalk signals along the corridor are still not operating.

The project was designed to make the busy stretch safer for both drivers and pedestrians, particularly near the Interstate 12 overpass where foot traffic is common. The improvements included new pedestrian signals, part of a broader effort to enhance safety along the roadway.

Deangelo Williams, a local electrician who travels the corridor regularly, said the nonfunctioning signals are creating confusion for both drivers and pedestrians.

“Sometimes I come travel through here sometimes I see a lot of people walking and sometimes they get in your way..” Williams said.

The area is lined with restaurants and businesses, drawing steady foot traffic throughout the day.

“Walking is how we get to places and it’s a lot of different food places here and we get a lot of people wanting to eat and they gotta walk to get there you know?” Williams said.

Without working crosswalk lights, Williams said pedestrians are often unsure when it is safe to cross.

“They have no direction they start walking and they don’t know when to walk you know they think the light is going to turn red and the next thing you know it’s back green and we’re ready to go,” Williams said.

City-parish officials acknowledged the signals are not yet operational.

“I know the crosswalk lights are not working because we are still waiting on a component that needed be in the actual controller box and that has not come in yet,” said Fred Raiford with Move EBR.

Raiford said officials have checked on the status of the missing part regularly.

“We’ve been asking every few weeks but probably what we’re told it’s going to be sometime end of march or first part of April,” he said.

Raiford added that the lack of functioning signals is contributing to ongoing concerns for pedestrians walking along Sherwood Forest Boulevard and under the interstate.

“Which is creating some of the problems that we’re having out there for people wanting to walk along Sherwood Forest and under the interstate and having the protection of the actual lights itself,” Raiford said.

Officials have not announced an exact date for when the crosswalk signals will be fully operational.