Posted on 09/06/2005 12:19:12 PM PDT by libstripper
It is time to swim against the tide. The direction of public discourse in the wake of Katrina goes like this: First we save lives and provide some basic assistance to the victims. Then we clean up New Orleans. And then we rebuild the city. Most will rightly agree on the first two. But should we rebuild New Orleans, 10 feet below sea level, just so it can be wiped out again?
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
It'll end up like FL, the state will provide insurance, with fed backing.
I agree with your original post.
Very good point. If insurance companies will not take the risk for obvious reasons then the taxpayer should not either. Property that is sufficiently high o be reasonably safe from flooding should and would be rebuilt. Parts of the city ensured to flood (only a matter of when not if) should not. I suspect that will leave New Orleans much as it used to be (a port city of modest size with serious limitations on inhabitable land).
Three problems:
1 - if you rebuild the dikes for a Cat 5 today, subsidense will sink them too low in a few decades.
2 - Forecasters obviously still don't adequately understand the mechanics of storm surge in a massive hurricane - note that the surge east of the eye's landfall was ten feet over what was forecast. The Corps may design Cat 5 levees that aren't high enough, putting people in danger.
3 - the Mississippi is poised to change channels eventually. Moving the city westward to higher ground would also put the city closer to the eventual channel change, facilitating building a canal to be ready for that eventual change.
Oh, and a fourth item - the Netherlands doesn't get Cat 5 hurricanes. Six feet is a lot of surge to them.
Which businesses will you invite to New Orleans? What middle class family of four who's lost everything has time to wait for the city to be rebuilt?
We can't build a city on spec'. People are going to move on with their lives; move to other parts of the country and start over.
There was a flash on Fox yesterday that indicated realtors were buying every piece of property in NO that they could get their hands on. Never heard anything more about it.
My vote says rebuild. This is one of the oldest and most colorful cities in the country. What we need here is a "Marshall Plan", similar to what we did after WW2.Give first preference of jobs to the people who lost their homes. It's time the "foreign aid stay here". Boom times are coming.
Yeah, I'm sure the people of Baton Rouge are going to bail out New Orleans. I don't think so. It's one thing to provide food, clothing, and shelter. When someone asks them to hand over their pocketbooks so they can go back and do it all over again, the sympathy factor is going to disappear.
"But should we rebuild New Orleans, 10 feet below sea level, just so it can be wiped out again?"
"We" didn't build New Orleans to begin with. The public works are paid for by municipal taxes and state funding. The individual homes are paid for by the individual. However all this came to be the first time is how it will come to be again.
Real Estate is extremely cheap in Louisiana compared to any other area in the nation. And a house is a fraction of the cost that you'd find on the West Coast or in New England. People who need affordable housing will be attracted to the area again. As long as that land remains in the hands of private landowners it will be developed. All they have to do is say, "We fixed the problems with the levees, the houses are built 1 ft higher, it won't happen again." and people will come.
The Democrats will push hard to get all the displaced persons back into New Orleans.
...
Too many of those displaced probably never saw the outside of N.O. If they decide not to return they can't be forced. I envision N.O. to be the next big boom $$ for newer generations to migrate to over the next twenty years claiming a stake in the rebuilding like the silicon valley was, as each new boom town was in the history of America. N.O. and surrounding areas are now mostly a blank canvas for the ambitious.
Good lawd...it is the No. 1 sea port in the U.S. as far as exporting Midwestern grain and goods, receiving oil and refining it, and it is the nation's top convention and tourism sites.
I can imagine a French Quarter national monument surrounded by restored wetlands. Make it a tourist attraxtion.
"Improve the dykes and breakwater systems ala Amsterdam and it will probably be way cheaper than rebuilding an entire city somewhere else."
That just means that much more volume of water WHEN the levee breaks again. The bigger the levee, the bigger the flood when it does break.
No don't rebuild!
We're told that to fend off a cat 4-5 there should be triple levee systems. These systems would take 20% of the landmass within NO. OK, that's a one time opportunity, and takes care of the first 20%, as long as the final inner levee is built of concrete, or something that will not just create so much weight that it will sink and crack apart faster.
Secondly, the economic interests at the southern terminus of the Mississsippi dictate that a major port should be placed there. OK, lets divert the Mississippi a bit to the east, into a large square basin that could berth numerous deep draft ships,and barges, using the spoils from dredging the basin to rebuild the triple levees. Then lets reroute the railroads to service this commodity port.
So that takes up lots more of the city. Now, lets build/rebuild the hotel infrastructure along with the casinos superdome, convention center and French quarter to make a destination resort area.
Finally create nearby housing complexes on higher ground, or on reclaimed ground, to provide housing for many of the port and service industry workers, as well as light rail service and adequate road network to the surrounding areas for the commuters.
There, solved!
I believe most of the remaining areas are technically National Parks anyway.
Build the houses in the low areas on stilts.
And build levees capable of withstanding a level 5 storm surge. Dredge out Lake Ponchartrain to make it deeper, and put the mud and slurry into NO to raise the level of the land.
And while you're at it, legalize casinos and prostitution, just like Las Vegas. And aim at the "medicinal marijuana" crowd, a la Amsterdam.
There's nothing wrong with New Orleans that a little Roman-epic-scaled engineering and moral decadence can't fix.
The ones that already have major investments there who will find it economicly more practical to refurbish and salvage their investment rather than abandon it and rebuild from scratch.
What middle class family of four who's lost everything has time to wait for the city to be rebuilt?
People will do whatever they have to do.
Many will move elsewhere to rebuild their lives,
Many others will choose to return to rebuild as best they can.
Those who leave provide room for others to move in.
Investors/developers will have access to prime real estate for urban redevlopment once the debris has been cleared.
It is the role of government to provide suitable infrastructure to facilitate that development.
I have no problem with that.
OK to rebuild, but with the following provisos:
1) In non historic areas, raze current buildings and infrastructure and pull a Galveston, raising grade levels using engineered fill.
2) Adopt Dutch methodology to deal with coastal defenses. Need to install moveable barriers across the Mississippi and the entrances to Lake Ponchartrain
3) Need to build structures offshore to replace the declining barrier islands (again, using the Netherlands as a model).
4) Focus on the port. As for other businesses, come what may.
5) Maximal local and private funding, minimal federal funding.
6) Appoint non corrupt, incorruptible outsiders to manage it all.
7) Etc ....
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