How the New Year's Day attacker was able to get through New Orleans security barriers

The big picture: Some experts have said that if existing security measures were in place on New Year's Day, they could have mitigated at least some of the chaos that unfolded along Bourbon Street.

• "Had they taken the usual measures and done them in the usual proximity to where he made his turn, they absolutely (would) stop this thing," Rob Reiter told the AP. Reiter is a Security Industry Association expert who specializes in stopping vehicle attacks on crowds and storefronts.
• Instead, after the suspect turned from Canal Street onto Bourbon, for the next three blocks, he drove practically unimpeded through the crowds.

Flashback: After a vehicle attack in Nice, France, in 2016, killed 86 people, New Orleans officials worried a similar attack could happen here.

• As a result, the city, led at the time by former Mayor Mitch Landrieu, put together a $40 million security plan that included installing bollards, standing up the city's Real-Time Crime Center and cameras, bomb-sniffing K9 dogs and bomb-resistant vehicles, Landrieu deputy Ryan Berni told Axios New Orleans this week. See the plan.
• "Our plan was for this specific event, this was the event that I was afraid of," Landrieu told The Times-Picayune last week. "I thought, 'S**t, that's going to happen on Bourbon Street.'"

Yes, but: The bollards, which have been a point of contention in the fallout from the New Year's Day attack, were gummed up by debris soon after they were installed in 2017, Mayor LaToya Cantrell said in a press conference last week.

• The bollards, Berni tells Axios New Orleans, were always going to need upkeep, but they were selected and manufactured with the idea in mind that Mardi Gras beads in particular could be a problem.
• Heald LTD, the company that designed them, told the AP this week that "basic maintenance and cleaning is all that is required" for upkeep.
• It's not clear how often the city kept up that kind of maintenance, but a confidential security report prepared for the French Quarter Management District in 2020 and obtained by the New York Times noted that they weren't working. The security firm that authored the report noted, in bold, that it "strongly recommends" they be fixed immediately.

State of play: However it happened, the bollards stopped working, and when the city started preparation to host Super Bowl LIX, replacing them was on the agenda.

• The city was in the process of doing that on New Year's Day, anticipating new versions would be ready to go for the NFL crowds in early February.
• But the new bollards aren't substantial enough to stop attacks like the one on New Year's Day, the Times-Picayune has reported.

What we're watching: Amid calls for accountability around security decisions made on New Year's, local and state leaders are leading inquiries into what new measures can be taken to improve French Quarter safety.

• On Wednesday, City Council members are set to grill the New Orleans Police Department and the Department of Public Works at a committee meeting Wednesday about "all barriers available to limit roadway and sidewalk access." Full story.

Go deeper

• Read a confidential security report prepared for the French Quarter Management District in 2020 via the New York Times. The public version is also online.
• Timeline: New Orleans terror attack was months in the making
• The victims of the Bourbon Street attack
• How to help after the Bourbon Street attack
• New Orleans leaders face questions over preventability of terror attack
• President Biden at St. Louis Cathedral: "New Orleans defines strength"
• Even as New Orleans mourns, Carnival begins again