Posted on 08/31/2005 1:52:50 PM PDT by Congressman Billybob
My engineering training kicked in when I saw the NASA photographs from space of New Orleans, and of the whole Gulf Coast of Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi. There is an obvious solution to the New Orleans problem. The Dutch have already demonstrated it.
Take New Orleans as the first and worst example. The pumps, levees and canals intended to protect New Orleans have been controlled by local authorities. They left three of the four pumping stations dependent on the local power grid.
Hellooo. The precise time those pumps are most needed is during a storm when the local power grid may fail. Yet local authorities saw fit to outfit only one pumping station with backup diesel generators to continue functioning.
At least one station was knocked out because its roof blew off. Hellooo. If a pumping station, desperately needed in a hurricane, has a roof that cannot withstand 130 MPH winds, someone was asleep at the switch.
The Internet gives some history of local control of these facilities. I understand that years ago, new and more powerful pumps were bought for these stations. But they were not installed, because the contract didn’t include that. So those pumps sat in a warehouse owned by a friend of Mayor Moon Landrieu (father of the current Senator Landrieu), incurring storage costs for four years, before another contract with another friend of the Mayor could be signed to install them.
This story is typical of many about various parts of New Orleans government. In any crisis in that city, it’s a race between corruption and incompetence for which will be the primary cause of the latest public failure. If New Orleans is to survive as a city, the first step must be to yank authority for flood control out of local hands and give it to the Army Corps of Engineers.
I refer to the Dutch example because that nation seized thousands of square miles from the Atlantic Ocean, and has held it for decades against the worst storms the Atlantic could toss at its dikes, dams, and flood gates. Apply that thinking first to New Orleans.
Nearby Lake Pontchartrain is one of the largest lakes in the United States. Its water storage capacity is enormous. So, the answer is simple. Dam the mouth of the Lake where it meets the Gulf, and release water only when the Lake level is higher than the Gulf.
Locks could guarantee continued access by boats and barges between the Lake and the Gulf. And that would make the Lake a safe refuge for boats, when the next major storm comes.
Second, rebuild the levees at a reliable level to withstand the worst storm surge in history, and rebuild the pumping stations so they can handle the demand, running on generator power that won’t fail. Build in redundancy, so maybe half of the pumping stations can fail, but the remaining ones can meet the demand.
The water storage capacity of Lake Pontchartrain may even be sufficient to prevent floods on the Mississippi from threatening New Orleans. Build a storm canal above New Orleans from the River into Lake Pontchartrain. Then, when a flood stage from heavy rains anywhere in the central US up to Minnesota threatens to break into New Orleans, open the canal to divert into the Lake enough water to break the flood crest.
Now look at the whole Gulf Coast. Word is now coming out that thousands of people, not merely hundreds, have died in coastal areas in Louisiana, Mississippi and Alabama. All that area cannot be protected. On a rational basis, using shortest lines, build dikes (Dutch example again) to protect part of those areas.
Beach areas which are the basis of the important tourist industry, would remain open. However, areas outside the dikes would have mandatory evacuation. Any who refused to evacuate would be given up for dead. Rescue would not be attempted.
New construction in the beach area should be on stilts. If illiterate Hondurans can get the message, so can Americans. The market would guarantee minimal functional construction in that area, if the Feds said, “No insurance, you’re on your own.” Like beach bars in the Caribbean, it would be enough to serve the purpose, easily replaced when destroyed.
There you have it. Problems solved for the long term. Here’s the link to the NASA photographs which show exactly how this could work: http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Newsroom/NewImages/images.php3
About the Author: John Armor is a First Amendment attorney and author who lives in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina. John_Armor@aya.yale.edu
Neither the navigability of the Mississippi nor the extraction of petroleum from the Gulf is dependent upon an urban area below sea level at New Orleans.
Man, that's some engineering feat! The Atlantic is hundreds of miles away (unless you mean the Netherlands Antilles).
Why should I pay for these people's misjudgement?
Why should I pay to rebuild a place that should not exist in the first place?
If you must raid our wallets, at least move the site to a sensible location so we don't have to be raided again after the next storm submerges the City Below the Sea.
I think the casinos should be rebuilt on land. It's stupid to have casino's such as they are, and "require" them to be "riverboats".
Plus if the Casino's rebuilt on land they could develop more beach in the area instead of trashing up the view of the Gulf with glitzy lights.
"Old dyke?"
No comment . . .
The Dutch take water management very seriously - there is a department for it, responsible to local government. It's a very sincere, austere business. I'm sure Dutch engineers and the Army Corps of Engineers working hand in hand could probably find a good solution.
I suggest, however, that given the traditions of corruption and political patronage in New Orleans, that the levee system should not be run by locals.
Regards, Ivan
Wonder what would happen to Holland if it got hit with a Cat 5 hurricane?
The North Sea is ever bit as dangerous as any hurricane when it is at its worst.
The local authority has been a curse for those people. Anytime Dems get control, patronage kicks in and efficient government is out the door. However, given the chaos this time, I wonder if the Dems are going to be able to organize their New Orleans urban machine and constituency the way they have been able to in the past. If they are all scattered and relocated, it may take time before their get-out-the-walking-money-and-turn-out-the-vote tactics will work quite so effectively.
Just another reason to make Bush out to be the villain and cause of their discomfort so early in the game. Of course, this must be done while simultaneously getting government money--and probably making out like it wasn't enough down the road.
New Orlean kept the rest of LA poor until Huey Long's time. The Long Machine was just as corrupt but at least brought development to the rest of the state.
Maybe more development to the west while abandoning that to the east Federalizing the dike system seems a good idea on the face of it.
It sounds like there was so much delta reclaimed by waterways that there is no direction to go but westward.
[snip]
As U.S. military engineers struggled to shore up breached levees, experts in the Netherlands expressed surprise that New Orleans' flood systems failed to restrain the raging waters.
With half of the country's population of 16 million living below sea level, the Netherlands prepared for a "perfect storm" soon after floods in 1953 killed 2,000 people. The nation installed massive hydraulic sea walls.
"I don't want to sound overly critical, but it's hard to imagine that (the damage caused by Katrina) could happen in a Western country," said Ted Sluijter, spokesman for the park where the sea walls are exhibited. "It seemed like plans for protection and evacuation weren't really in place, and once it happened, the coordination was on loose hinges."
[snip]
Ive seen the dyke system in Holland , it's amazing.
There is a very reactionary and very, very expensive enviornmental plan pending federal funding that would take out the flood control done by the army corps of engineers so flooding can rebuild the marshes. I am reminding you of this because these people will surely step forward with militancy and insist that theirs is the right plan, and throw monkey wrenches into any other ideas..
Dont be so sure of that .Ive seen the Holland Dyke System ..Massive , 10/15 ft thick concret walls at points, all movable to let water and pressure in and out. They are an amazing engineering marvel.
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