BATON ROUGE - A popular downtown bike rental business is closing after being evicted from its site.

The owner of Geaux Ride, Charles Daniel, tells me he was evicted from the Third S treet unit after refusing to buy a brand-new HVAC for a storefront he was leasing from Commercial Propert ies Realty Trust, the real estate investment trust for the Baton Rouge Area Foundation .

"For some reason, they are saying that I need to replace a working HVAC unit, that replacement is $15,000 expense, and I am refusing to pay it," Daniel said.

D aniel says his business has been operating out of a downtown storefront since 2020.

He says over the past two years , he's been going back and forth with his landlord over the HVAC un

See Full Page