Comments on: Rebuild New Orleans

By: Margaret Edgington

Margaret Edgington — Fri, 10 Feb 2006 16:10:44 +0000

People who appear to be perfectly rational question whether New Orleans should be rebuilt after the devastating failure of its infrastructure to stand up to two catastrophic storms in one month. That is not a rational response to the desperate plight of New Orleans residents.
Here in Oregon we sit astride the mother of all subduction zone faults. We’re downstream from millions of gallons of radioactive material that’s moving at groundwater speed into the Columbia River. Downhill from Mount St Helens, an erupting volcano, we mistakenly feel safe in our little bastion. In my hometown; Portland, Oregon, if the mountain had been pointing our way when the big one blew in 1980 hundreds of thousands of Portland residents could have been in the same sorry shape as the hundreds of thousands of wandering New Orleanians: waiting in some god-awful motel in Fresno or Pocatello to hear if our fellow Americans would care enough about our corner of our nation to come dig us out. The essence of our pact with our fellow Americans is this: “We’ll dig you out”.
Levees, drainage and storm water engineering are all issues that can be dealt with. Focus on the people. The solutions to these issues need to be created for the people of New Orleans, wherever they are scattered and wherever they will reside in the future

By: Callimachus

Callimachus — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 21:16:56 +0000

I’d ask, then, if it would be even more ethical to abandon Los Angeles and San Francisco right now, because we know with statistical certainty that at some date they will suffer enormous earthquake damage.

By: Callimachus

Callimachus — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 18:59:05 +0000

“Agon” is not a typo. It’s a word. Look it up.

By: Joshua

Joshua — Mon, 12 Sep 2005 15:15:12 +0000

[Katrina's aftermath] is our first and enduring national agon. [sic] We are a land of people striving for material success, and there will always be losers in that game. At the same time, we are a people of deep spiritual sensbility, and our faiths forbid us to leave the poor to suffer. By the same token, faith combined with common sense forbids us from setting people up to suffer in the first place, which is exactly what we would be doing by rebuilding New Orleans on its current site, below sea level in a frequent path of hurricanes and sandwiched between the sea, a major river and a huge lake. No matter what precautions or preventive measures are taken, or how well New Orleans breaks from its socially dysfunctional past, it's only a matter of time before the "soup bowl" where New Orleans now sits ends up under water again, and again, and again. And Jack Shafer's not the only one making a case against rebuilding at the current site. This page on the Porkopolis blog not only makes the same case, but links to several other bloggers who also advocate moving the city, if not disbanding it outright. The author makes a great point that has received short shrift in the debate over rebuilding New Orleans:

Rebuilding New Orleans is not only a political question. In light of the suffering that has occured after the flooding, it has become an ethical question. Do we condemn future New Orleans residents to the same fate?

To put it another way: Are we Americans, including those of us who are also Louisianans or New Orleanians, really willing to risk someday putting any of our children, grandchildren or descendants through the same kind of hell that the people of New Orleans are going through now? Are we really willing to sink billions of dollars into rebuilding the city each and every time it floods? We have to think about these questions now, before we make not only a bad decision, but a historical precedent to make the same bad decision over and over again in the future.

By: Noodles

Noodles — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 13:07:08 +0000

“The city could survive as an enclave for the very rich and tourists, much as Venice has. ”

New Orleans, the new Venice…..Nuff Said.

By: Justin Gardner

Justin Gardner — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 07:26:10 +0000

Jeez…with each post you teach me something new Cal, I swear.

Personally, I’m torn on this issue. I agree that we should rebuild, but the question is obviously, “How?”

Right now we have an opportunity to create a new city ABOVE the flood plain that will be much safer against natural disasters. Some wish to never build in those places again. I think we should simply fill in the land and build on top of it.

Whatever may come to pass, I’m sure the whimsy will be considered and I hope that’s the prevailing wisdom. It doesn’t make much sense to replicate a situation where people will get everything wiped out.

However, I come from a place where my family has been flooded several times and the city finally widen the river to accomodate the reality of the situation. There seems to me to be some sort of compromise in this situation and the “mound” you speak of could be accomplished with enough money and enough time.

Will it happen? I have no idea, but I hope that we can recapture the spirit of this city without completely reshaping and relocating it.

By: Callimachus

Callimachus — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 03:16:24 +0000

This is whimsy, but the ancients would have simply torn down the old city, heaped it up, and built a new citadel on top of the pile. That’s how Troy got to be a mound.

By: Constantine

Constantine — Sat, 10 Sep 2005 02:42:20 +0000

There’s a practical reason not to rebuild parts of not just New Orleans but the entire metropolitan area. Namely, many of these places are former wetlands. They’re areas that are meant to be flooded, and trying to prevent water from going there just means that the water is going to flood elsewhere. It’s not necessarily wise to regard every flooded piece of land as a place that needs to be drained and built upon.

So yes, rebuild New Orleans, but rebuild it wisely. Don’t regard every empty patch of land as a construction opportunity.