Mardi Gras truck parade faces danger after dark, captain says. 'We have zero protection'

Kim Mercadal, the captain of the Crescent City truck parade, says there’s danger brewing in the final hours of Mardi Gras.

In 2024, she said, the convoy of decorated semi trucks that brings New Orleans Carnival to a close wasn't able to get rolling til 3:40 p.m. – three to four hours past the traditional start time of about noon.

When the Crescent City truck parade starts that late, it ends after dark, she said.

That can be a big problem, Mercadal said, because the trailers are designed for the daytime, and lack extra lighting. So, as they’re being towed home after the parade — carrying riders as far as the north shore or the West Bank — they can be difficult to see. In 2024, she said, the parade was still rolling at 7 p.m.

Not only that, she said. The parade, which has followed float parades Rex and Zulu on Fat Tuesday since 1947, sometimes gets tangled up with traffic going to and coming from the route. Motorists even slip between the trucks.

Mercadel told the committee that she wants the float parades to finish sooner so the truck parade can go back to rolling at noon. And, she wants police protection as the floats leave the parade route and head home.

“We have zero protection,” she told the City Council’s Carnival Legislative Advisory Committee on Tuesday. 

The truck parades are a largely unsung Carnival tradition. Families, social clubs and coworkers get together to decorate plywood trailers that serve as homemade floats, which are towed down St. Charles Avenue following the Zulu and Rex parades. The truck parade has a different tone than the float parades, she said. “I’ve got grandma down to grandchild in the parade,” she said.

The truck parades may be humble compared to the spectacular float processions. But they’re certainly not small. The Crescent City truck parade typically includes 60 or more trucks and 3,000 riders. The Elks Orleans truck parade, which precedes it, also has scores of hand-decorated floats and an army of partying passengers. After the Crescent City truck parade, Mercadal said the truck floats disperse and make their way home individually, still carrying their riders. 

In 2024, Mercadal said, one of her truck floats was involved in a traffic accident on Claiborne Avenue after the parade. Two riders went to the hospital, though they were soon released.

Also this year, the inadequately lit truck floats with riders aboard caught the eye of police patrolling the Lake Pontchartrain Causeway and Huey P. Long Bridge. The Causeway police stopped a float, then escorted it and two others across the bridge, she said. 

It can be dangerous, she said, and also disappointing. The crowds are sometimes exhausted and have left the route by the time the delayed trucks arrive. “Those people have given up and gone home,” Mercadel said.

Speaking to the meeting, Mercadel said if the lineup of Mardi Gras morning parades runs late, then her convoy, the Crescent City truck parade, runs latest of all. Road construction on the Zulu route and a Rex float that hit a tree limb also led to delays in 2024.

“I just want (Crescent City) to go back to rolling at noon,” she said.

“We know Zulu and Rex run late sometimes,” said City Council member Lesli Harris, who chaired Tuesday’s Carnival Legislative Advisory Committee. “Surely we can help with the safety of the truck parades.”