Posted on 04/18/2006 12:36:04 PM PDT by Ellesu
Sinking land ultimately reduces effectiveness of levee protection:
The Army Corps of Engineers discovered a $4 billion surprise by underestimating the cost of repairing the levees because south Louisiana is sinking. One geologist has said the sinking will continue, especially in New Orleans East, because that part of town rests on a fault line.
Bad roadways have become a common complaint over the years for some New Orleans residents, but to LSU Geologist Dr. Roy Dokka, they’re scientific evidence which demonstrate that the ultimate problem goes much deeper.
Dokka suggests that Louisiana is not only sinking, but was sliding out toward the south, along the edge of a fault line in New Orleans East – namely Michoud.
For the last century, Michoud has sunk up to two inches per year; taking the levees down with it – four feet total since 1960. According to Dokka’s study, New Orleans East has sunk deeper than any other area in the state and at a much faster rate. It’s a phenomenon that contributes to lower levees and protection from storm surge.
Dokka said it’s a simple case of building for now rather than later.
The Army Corps of Engineers, which funded Dokka’s study, said the sinking land accounts for the rising cost of levees, which means there’s no magic number for any category of levee protection, whether it's category-3 this year or category-5 down the road.
The Corps has called the situation “an extraordinary conundrum,” adding that Dokka’s findings would certainly factor into plans for rebuilding the levees.
As for the price, Dokka said it's more like an installment payment as it seems south Louisiana will be paying for levee protection forever.
"Once we build the levees -- that's not enough. We've got to keep thinking about how they're changing and continue to build them up in certain places,” Dokka said.
If the Democrats could name that fault, I am sure they would call it "Bush's Fault"
I have been watching History Channel and others programming on the SF Earthquake of 1906. Half the population displaced and hundreds killed.
Now, just how could there possible be a city there now since I heard nothing about the Feds providing everything to take care of the poor abused citizens.
If it sinks fast enough we won't have to spend multiple billions of dollars for repairs and upgrades.
When billions of federal dollars are spent in a futile effort to fight nature, it will be "Bush's fault".
Isn't it racist not to rebuild New Orleans just as it was before? But then if it keeps sinking with people moved back in, would that be racist? I guess I don't know which is the more politically correct thing to do - rebuild in an unsafe place or don't rebuild at all.
"it will be "Bush's fault"."
Well, he DID approve of giving them billions to rebuild. Dennis Hastert was one of the few that had the guts to suggest NOT rebuilding in a sinking swamp.
...and I don't wanna swim.
I'm praying for another Cat 4 (or even a Cat 5) to bring that sinkhole to an end.
Thanks(Sarc)
It is sinking under the weight of decades of graft, corruption, and pc bs. If they don't start cleaning up that mess fast, N O will soon join the Titanic, Bismark, Monitor, and Merimac.
We may get that wish since hurricane activity is on the upswing. The last one was more exciting than a super bowl.
Issac Newton hates Black people.
Fitting analogies all. Will NO succumb to a storm like the Titanic or the Monitor, be sunk by patisan warfare like the Bismarck or be scuttled from necessity like the Virginia (merrimac to the uninformed)?
I keep saying, turn it into a houseboat marina.
Admiral Nagin, get on board with this idea.
Scratch that Titanic analogy and substitute: be navigated to disaster by inept politicians.
Or be driven into the ground by a drunken captain (Nagin) like the Exxon Valdez??
"Isn't it racist not to rebuild New Orleans just as it was before?"
I drove into the Chocolate City from Slidell through east Orleans Parish the weekend before last. What I saw was appalling. Mile after mile of neighborhoods that are veritable ghost towns. These are, so far as I could see, some apartment complexes but mostly brick or wood frame homes built on the ground---probably now completely full of mold and eaten up by termites. Didn't see a single car or person moving in them. Not one. Empty, littered, debris-filled streets with no sign of life. Entire ruined shopping centers appeared to be untouched since the storm and maybe abandoned for good. Eerie. Looked like something from a science fiction movie set.
What that area needs the most is to return to what it was 150 years ago-----a cypress swamp.
"When billions of federal dollars are spent in a futile effort to fight nature, it will be "Bush's fault".
More like France's fault for building a city in the swampy delta in the first place.....maybe the Frenchie Frogs will fix it now if we sell Naw Lens back to them.....with Katrina interest.....
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