In an evacuation, buses would be dispatched along their regular routes throughout the city to pick up people and go to the Superdome, which would be used as a staging area. From there, people would be taken out of the city to shelters to the north.
Some experts familiar with the plans say they won't work.
"That's never going to happen because there's not enough buses in the city," said Charley Ireland, who retired as deputy director of the New Orleans Office of Emergency Preparedness in 2000. "Between the RTA and the school buses, you've got maybe 500 buses, and they hold maybe 40 people each. It ain't going to happen."
The plan has other potential pitfalls.
No signs are in place to notify the public that the regular bus stops are also the stops for emergency evacuation. In Miami Beach, Fla., every other bus stop sports a huge sign identifying it as a hurricane evacuation stop.
It's also unclear whether the city's entire staff of bus drivers will remain. A union spokesman said that while drivers are aware of the plan, the union contract lacks a provision requiring them to stay.
If you can expect a reasonable lead time in the call to evacutate (=trust the leadership), then you can expect bus drivers to do it. But if the leadership waits until the storm is ten feet offshore, then I wouldn't hang around, either. I'd get my family and go. You can drive a bus anywhere.
If they started early enough, they could have gotten almost everyone out who wanted to leave.