What sort of public transportation could New Orleans mustered to move 100,000 people in 18 hours? Others have suggested totally unrealistic ideas such as steam boats and C-130s.
The guys may not have made the best decision, but these decisions aren't as easy as many are making them out to be. We go through this all the time everytime something happens in this country and the democrats start yelling "Bush had not plan" or "Rumsfeld should have anticipated this".
10 passenger trains of 10 coaches each. The main train station in New Orleans is LITERALLY right next door to the Superdome. Only problem: finding 100 passenger cars.
In Chicago, the moring trains move 300,000+ every morning (couple of hours) and every evening.
And the even bigger problem - where are you going to move them to? Anyplace within 150 miles is likely going to need its own shelters for local needs before this is over. (And the nearest non- coastal cities within easy range (Jackson and Baton Rouge) are both under 250,000 population. No way either of them could handle another 50,000 folks - both are packed with folks that got themselves that far. The nearest big cities are Houston, Dallas, Memphis and Birmingham.
At 50 people per busload, we are talking 2,000 busloads in 1080 minutes. If 20 sites for boarding were established throughout the parish, this would be an average of 100 busloads per site over the course of 1080 minutes, or about 1 busload every ten minutes for the entire period of time. With lots of training and lots of practice and perfect execution, this might be possible. In reality, I agree that such a rate cannot reasonably be expected to be attained, without proper education of the public in advance as to what they would need to do, coupled with adequate equipment and flawless logistics.