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Topic: Gustav and New Orleans
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| UGoGirl | Posted – 8/30/2008 10:25:33 AM | show profile It looks like another hurricane might hit New Orleans dead on. I know I am going to sound like a cold-hearted b**ch, but I don't think it's realistic that New Orleans can ever become what it once was. I think it can continue on in a much reduced (population) state, perhaps a series of natural waterways for future floods/hurricanes. But to continue building and rebuilding houses there below sea level seems to be an absurd waste of money and resources, and risks the continued loss of life too. I'm just trying to be realistic here. Especially with the realities of global warming, New Orleans may be hit by a major hurricane every 5 or so years. Perhaps a totally devastating one every 10 or 15 years. Living below sea level in an environment such as this is no longer possible. We should do what we can to encourage more and more people to relocate away from New Orleans and get rid of housing below sea level. I know its heartless to say this and would break people's hearts to leave, but I'm just trying not to be in denial here. |
| chucho | Posted – 8/30/2008 12:02:47 PM | show profile I can see the logic, but I disagree. For one thing, Holland has more land below sea level than NOLA and they have a much more advanced and sturdy system. The failure of the levees is a failure of federal infrastructure development and incompetence more befitting a Third World country. Secondly, the city is a major port that connects many cities in the Midwest with the world. Tulsa, Oklahoma is a seaport because it connects to NOLA. The development of this port city has increased the likelihood of flooding. These are man-made canals. The destruction of wetlands to make sea passages has increased the city's vulnerability to sea surges. If the national infrastructure has created this climate, the nation owes the city competence in flood management. 100-year floodwalls is a joke. (It basically means that in a lifetime you have a 60% of being hit hard -- it does NOT man one time in 100 years. The Netherlands standard STARTS at 250 years and goes up to like 2,000 years or something like that.) Lastly, the city is arguably one of the most interesting in the south. As far as I'm concerned the "let is sink" attitude is awful. Just use up one of the most fascinating cities in the country (by surrounding it with man-made canals, stripped away mangrove swamps to make sea channels, then installing incompetent and skimpy levels of protection) and then toss it out like a used condom? I dunno. I really like that crappy, hot, humid Third World city (even if it's filled with both KKK-type rednecks an ghetto trash) and I think America has had a history of treating it like a bastard stepchild. Nobody would give up on New York City or Sacramento. I think it's Sacramento (or some other NoCal city, but I'm pretty sure Sacramento) that will be hit hard if global warming predictions come true. I really find it disgraceful that we're spending hundred sof billions of dollars in Iraq when a sliver of that money could be used to hire competent Dutch engineers (they've offered) to build world-class flood controls for the major exit route for most of America's Midwestern sea routes. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 8/30/2008 8:56:45 PM | show profile Chucho, it was New Orleans a few years ago. Next time Tampa? Then Galveston? Houston? Yes I agree far far better to spend our money on our own infrastructure than wars, but our infrastructure is crumbling all across the country. And most people want to pay as little in taxes as possible. We want to pass the debts onto the next generations. I just don't think as a country we're up for doing what it would take. So better to cut our losses. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 8/30/2008 8:56:46 PM | show profile Chucho, it was New Orleans a few years ago. Next time Tampa? Then Galveston? Houston? Yes I agree far far better to spend our money on our own infrastructure than wars, but our infrastructure is crumbling all across the country. And most people want to pay as little in taxes as possible. We want to pass the debts onto the next generations. I just don't think as a country we're up for doing what it would take. So better to cut our losses. |
| chucho | Posted – 8/31/2008 7:42:21 AM | show profile Well then crumbling infrastructure is the problem, not to mention Medieval levees. Here are some picks of what a modern flood control system looks like. http://nolation.com/ |
| questoo1 | Posted – 8/31/2008 7:54:53 AM | show profile last I checked Holland is not typically in the direct path of category 4 & 5 hurricanes. How would their systems hold under duress? While im sure there is plenty of blundering going on in New Orleans, there is only so much engineering can do. |
| chucho | Posted – 8/31/2008 4:15:47 PM | show profile Holland gets some pretty hard Northern Atlantic storms and surges. And their floodwalls are designed to be the first line of defense against surges -- by breaking the surges before they come in, you put less pressure on the levees inside the barrier. In fact, Mary Landreau advocates collaboration with Holland, so this isn't just a harebrained scheme from left field. This is part of America's degrading infrastructure. This isn't a matter of "gee, we should be careful otherwise we'll lose our standing." We've already lost our standing. And it's not just European infrastructure that makes us look like a poor South American country; there are "emerging economies" that have telecommunications networks that make America's look like some old, rusty Soviet system. It's really pathetic, and it's terrible to hear people say "oh, well, f**k it, just let NOLA sink 'cause nobody want to pay to save it." |
| Grateful Deadline | Posted – 8/31/2008 10:10:39 PM | show profile By the same token, I think we should encourage people to leave all the towns and cities in Tornado Alley. Also, cities near rivers, which eventually flood; in snowy areas, which eventually have blizzards and ice storms; and dry areas, which eventually suffer through drought. To be realistic about avoiding government aid for repetitive causes, we should get rid of them all. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 9/1/2008 12:37:53 AM | show profile Well, I'm not saying or implying that the whole city be abandoned. Perhaps that's what some are hearing but that that's not my intention. I recall a couple of years ago someone was trying to draw up plans to greatly reduce housing in areas below sea level, convert those basically back to flood plains, and leaving the other areas at safer levels still viable for housing. This would likely mean a much smaller population in New Orleans. But from what I heard, that didn't go over well. These areas below sea level were never meant for homes. This is why we have things like flood plain maps. And the flood plains change. Yes, I know you were being sarcastic, but living in a flood plain is far different from living in an area that gets blizzards now and then. Here's another thing, why the hell do we think we have the right to live in the desert? Yes, a few nomads, perhaps the land can support a town here and there, but major cities in the desert? Funny, people are quick to say we have to adapt to our new circumstances, but if it becomes apparent that we can't keep building homes in flood plains then people get all riled up. It just doesn't make sense. |
| chucho | Posted – 9/1/2008 4:33:29 AM | show profile I wouldn't call NOLA a flood plain. Again, the flooding that occurred were from levees on man-made canals. Flood plains are more like cities along major rivers -- like many towns and cities along the Mississippi, that, by your reasoning, should be relocated. Will this be a Mao Tse Tung-style relocation? Will we force Grand Rapids to move all their people out of flood plains by carrot or by stick, or will we just promise not to help Grand Rapids the next time it floods -- they're on their own like anyone who has remained in NOLA past Sunday? I don't agree that humans being are suppose to avoid every place and every climate that required human ingenuity to settle. BY your standard we shouldn't be living in most of the American Southwest, and LA only survive because we pump water from neighboring states into the city. And Las Vegas? . . . Well, OK, maybe we should emplty Las Vegas : ) But we don't have the options our hunting and gathering ancestors had to follow the bison or when the world population was a few hundred million people. By your reasoning, most of Holland's major cities are not habitable, and were it not for the human ingenuity of the Dutch, The Hague would be on a small island every time there was a storm. I hate to sound cheesy with this argument for human spirit and ingenuity (and certainly this isn't the only reasons why I think we should save NOLA), but there is something to be said about meeting a challenge rather than giving up on it. |
| UGoGirl | Posted – 9/1/2008 1:26:31 PM | show profile Chucho, you are hard-headed! That's OK, I am too. I can imagine the type of woman who would work well with you, she'd be very zen-like, intelligent, but not prone to argument, has a healthy enough sense of self and peace within her to allow you to win the argument, etc. Of course that might not be the type of woman you are attracted to... |
| chucho | Posted – 9/1/2008 2:03:42 PM | show profile What are you talking about? You're postulating that the best thing we should do is abandon a major city in the United States because people don't like taxes and because of the "realities" of global warming. When in fact it's not so much global warming as a general (and probably kind of racist) historical neglect of the region. Why would I "let" you win that argument? This is an old story. Neglect, incompetence, corruption and racism. This has nothing to do with global warming. LOUISIANA 1927 (by Randy Newman) What has happened down here is the wind have changed Clouds roll in from the north and it started to rain Rained real hard and rained for a real long time Six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline The river rose all day The river rose all night Some people got lost in the flood Some people got away alright The river have busted through cleard down to Plaquemines Six feet of water in the streets of Evangelne CHORUS Louisiana, Louisiana They're tyrin' to wash us away They're tryin' to wash us away Louisiana, Louisiana They're tryin' to wash us away They're tryin' to wash us away President Coolidge came down in a railroad train With a little fat man with a note-pad in his hand The President say, "Little fat man isn't it a shame what the river has done To this poor crackers land." |
| chucho | Posted – 9/1/2008 2:04:56 PM | show profile PS: That song was written in 1973. |
| Grateful Deadline | Posted – 9/1/2008 3:09:55 PM | show profile UGo, are you even aware that the population of New Orleans is a little more than half what it was pre-Katrina? Or that much of what was destroyed hasn't been and won't be rebuilt? It sounds like you're a long, long distance away from what's been going on in New Orleans. |
| chucho | Posted – 9/1/2008 4:20:14 PM | show profile Also UGO, I have been able to admit when I'm wrong on these threads. It's just that for the most part I pretty much only comment this forcefully on issues about which I feel strongly. And it bothers me great to hear people talk about NOLA as a lost cause. This isn't an issue of debating policy issues. This debate started with a suggestion that we completely depopulate New Orleans and write it off as a lost cause. I prefer to laud for a European style of high taxes with good social benefits and a healthy infrastructure. If America continues to choose what the French call "democraisie sauvage" then America will not last as a superpower. If America can't build the same infrastructure of a country smaller than most US states then, well, it's pathetic; a country that deserve to collapse into the social decay you see in the conservative bastions of the country (lower wages, teenage pregnancy, theology passing as science on public classrooms, abstinence only programs that don't work, high divorce rates, an explosion in methamphetamine addition, larger populations of mentally ill, less economic development, more guns and homelessness and under-employment and the creation of the conservative welfare state, just to name a few) |
| al medio | Posted – 9/2/2008 7:04:41 AM | show profile N.Y.S. residents at this moment were given a $400 million bill for a new Yankee Stadium. We have no choice but to pay if we want to live in this state. The same thing should happen in Lousiana. If the state wants New Orleans, then they should foot the bill to make it as safe as possible. And what the hell happened to the $2 billion post Katrina money that the city received? |
| chucho | Posted – 9/2/2008 11:14:43 AM | show profile >> If the state wants New Orleans, then they should foot the bill to make it as safe as possible. And what the hell happened to the $2 billion post Katrina money that the city received? 1?17 out of 17 messages << That info is available at. gov sites for anyone curious enough to do the research. Again, NOLA is a major port city and the gateway not only for Midwestern port cities to connect to the rest of the world but also a major conduit for 25% of US domestic crude and 20% of its natural gas. Also: BY your argument perhaps NYC o any other city should not receive any funding whatsoever for its ports of national significance. Louisisna, like over a doze other southern states are conservative-led welfare states with people always complaining about "Marxism" ir whatever but who are more than happy to take handouts from the federal gov't to fix their roads and provide health insurance programs for small businesses (among so many other wealth-redistribution policies that sends money form rich blue states to poor red states). The state of Louisiana does not have the financial resources to maintain an important national infrastructure, nor should it be expected to. Just as the National Guard is our "well-regulated militia" that is controlled by the federal government, so too is vital infrastructure. It works the other way around, too. Nobody is expecting Nevada to pay for the storage of nuclear waste on a fault line in Yucca Mountain. Why? Because it's considered a kind of "eminent domain" by the federal government to store nuclear waste somewhere. The fundamental debate is where the line is drawn between federal and state -- and I do think that a major port city in America is something that falls into the domain of "federal". By your reaosning there would be no FEMA -- states would be on their own to cleanup after major disasters. Next time there's a huge earthquake in California, will you be telling people affected by it that they're own their own? That why should have thought about that beforehand? That they should cleanup after themselves and don't expect "handouts" from the federal government? Are we a country or are we 50 little autonomous, self-sufficient regions? Hey here's a great idea: Why the ell did the rest of the country have to pitch in for 9/11 cleanup, huh? NYC is rich, if they want to cleanup after 9/11, why should they take "handouts" from the federal government. It's their fault they didn't plan for adequate security measures. What a bunch of freeloaders! (Sarcasm alert for those of you not reading my post carefully enough.) Oh, and PS: without this qelth distribution those poor hillbilly states would be screwed. You think they're "Third World" right now? Wait till you expect Mississippi, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, South Carolina, etc. to carry their own financial obligations! New Jersey woudl have MORE money not less if it didn't have to dole out welfare money to Oklahoma so that Oklahoma can fix its roads and subsidize health insurance for small businesses. |
| chucho | Posted – 9/2/2008 11:19:56 AM | show profile Just to be clear: states that pay more in federal income tax than they get back are essentially subsidizing states that get more in federal funding than they pay in income tax. I find it interesting that Texas is pretty self-sufficient, thanks to HIGHER property taxes compared to it's fellow conservative "pull yourselves up by yer bootstrap" red states. So, yes, "Taxachusetts" ends up subsidizing federal programs in places like Mississippi. That's pretty socialist of Mississippi ;) As a European-style social democrat, I support such wealth redistribution, but it behooves the racist, sexist right-wing peanut gallery of fiscal conservatives to be men (and women) enough to admit they take handouts like the little poor sots they are in their backward places with no economic development, poor infrastructure, and not enough tax revenue to pay for their own damn services and maintenance. Bitching about "Taxachusetts" is basically biting the hand that feeds." |
| Grateful Deadline | Posted – 9/2/2008 6:52:15 PM | show profile >>N.Y.S. residents at this moment were given a $400 million bill for a new Yankee Stadium. We have no choice but to pay if we want to live in this state. The same thing should happen in Lousiana. If the state wants New Orleans, then they should foot the bill to make it as safe as possible. << Yankee Stadium and a port city vital to the nation's economy are equivalent: Is that what you're saying? |
