I can’t, for the life of me, understand why New Orleans didn’t consult with the engineers in the Netherlands that seem to handle being below sea-level quite capably.
or the dikes.
Actually, the Dutch have used pump designs which originated in New Orleans. The Netherlands' superiority is in building flood control gates to tame the sea, roughly the same task as stopping hurricane storm surges. One such project was planned in the New Orleans area on the 1970s... but some environmentalist wackos sued in federal court and succeeded in halting the project.
Even though the Dutch aren't hobbled by the enviro-idiots, I still wouldn't want to live under a canal.