Rebuilding in New Orleans should have been postponed until after the levees were fixed, right?

Question

Maybe I am wrong but I had heard that they have already been rebuilding in New Orleans, but now I hear that the levees aren't even done being fixed yet. Which dummy would give the okay to rebuild when there's nothing to protect the newly built properties yet?

Answer 1

See...you ain't so dum.

Answer 2

indeed, why hasn't the democrat controlled congress done anything about it???? WHY? should we impeach Pelosi??? YES we should!!!!

Answer 3

They have "repaired" the levees. But they were still working on them, to make them stronger. What would you have them do? Make people leave their home city for years while they work on the levees?

And the notion that a city as unique and culturally significant as N.O. should be abandoned is absurd. Families have been living there for generations. It's their HOME. Saying they should never rebuild is cruel. There are MANY places in this country that are at high risk of natural disasters, should we abandon all flood zones? all of tornado ally? all of CA (earthquakes)?

EDIT: To "peaceful" - they did change the building requirements.

Answer 4

No they shouldn't have started building before fixing the levees. but i'm from louisiana so here is my take on it.

It is believed by many that the levees were temporary levees not permanent. I believe this too. But unlike Katrina we are prepared this time. This time there are no last minute evacuation. They have the national guard in going door to door and around neighborhoods telling people there are mandatory evacuations. I'm more in central Louisiana and they are having a town meeting about whether there should be a mandatory evacuation of our city. Anyone who chooses not to leave after a mandatory evacuation is in plan will not receive help (because everyone is leaving ) or insurance. so there you go!!

lol sorry about writing so much i just needed to let that out.

Answer 5

It would appear that mother nature has decide to annex some land and there is nothing gonna stop it.  Sure we could be really determined and keep throwing money at it or we could be smart and write it off.

There is nothing that can be done..land appears, disappears, and reappears as a part of nature.   Our little spot in time is nothing.

Valuable resources have been and will be spent in fighting the inevitable.  Fight against nature and you have a 100% chance of failure everytime.  Human lifespan makes us unable to concieve the timeframe that nature works on...so basically we are monkeys with tools.

Let it go already.   I promise we can have "disadvantaged" people to still vote democrat in another city.  

Answer 6

Good question

I'm an interested observer from outside the US and I watched the whole Katrina episode with fascination.

Now with Gustav bearing down, I wonder is evacuating an entire city every time there is a threat of a hurricane a sustainable policy?

Three years is not long enough to complete a job to restore, heighten the levees, but if New Orleans is to survive it has to be done and obviously, the quicker the better

Answer 7

they below sea level areas of NO need to be abandoned.

Answer 8

Maybe we should not have rebuilt including the levees.

Answer 9

the levees were rebuilt and strengthened in last three years.

i would have demanded all homes be built on stilts above sea level, out of harm's way.  but i am in the dreaded private sector.

Answer 10

Problem is this....thousands of homeless! You have to rebuild homes, stores, gas stations etc to house people while you work on the levees or those thousands have nowhere to live and very few options.

Answer 11

I am going to give you two very sad facts.

It has been three years since Katrina

In less then a year, after devastating floods hit China a few years ago, they promised to rebuild ALL the brick and mortar homes that were destroyed.  They met that goal ahead of time.  These are not trailers, or cardboard shacks, these are homes built for families to last for a lifetime.

A few days ago, China promised their nation that they would rebuild the quake damaged areas within 3 years to pre quake levels or better.

A few days ago, a news article came out about the dead following Katrina with the surprising discovery that most of the dead were elderly.  What in the h**l ever happened to using a data base?  What in the h**l is wrong with America to allow this c**p to continually happen?  What in the h**l is wrong with our government that they can't even get their c**p together and beat a third world country in the race to take care of the people after devastation?

The answer is very simple.

We have been reduced to being complacent and dumb.

This country was built on the notion of the People first, we are so far from that today. Now its about business, bucks and not helping each other.  We have become what we hated in the past, and we are accepting that.

It is BS that it will take years to rebuild the levees.  China has proven that it takes the will to make things happen.  We lack the will, we lack the vision and we lack the common sense of putting the people first.

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Life is so simple, but we insist on making it complicated

Confucius

551 - 479 BC

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Peace

Jim

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Answer 12

I have been following this issue and providing help and support for 3 years;  no doubt we are concerned now with hurricane Gustav.

It is a complex political issue and of course there was so much bungling.

Authorites had to be optimistic and rebuild concurrent with the levees.  there is no rebuilding ahead of the levees that I know of, they are way behind.

We needed rebuilding, infrastructure, services and homes, whether it was going to happen again or not.

There was thought of doing nothing and abandoning the area too.

IMO, too much engineering and thinking was also done to have better levees, costing time, and now it does look stupid, they are not fully complete.  And it might take decades to add the additional wetlands as buffer zones, that is part of the levee plan, because I get the feeling that just levees won't work anyhow.

It always has been a disaster waiting to happen, and could happen again.

Answer 13

All of the levees damaged by Katrina were repaired and reinforced by the summer of 2006. The levee system has been getting a $14 Billion upgrade that is scheduled to be complete in 2011 or 2012, with more work planned for after that.  Realize the levee system is 330 MILES long.

The damage from Katrina was so great that the levee repairs were done before most rebuilding efforts were even started - happend "de facto". It was not realistic to put rebuilding on hold until the levee upgrade is finished. New Orleans has a population of almost 1,400,000 so it's not some little town that can be moved or abandoned.

Finally, history, architecture, culture, and the fact the city is home to many people are usually mentioned when the topic of rebuilding is discussed.  However, those factors (while significant) are NOT why NOLA is important to the rest of the United States.  Much of America's critical national infrastructure is in New Orleans and rebuilding could not wait until the levee upgrades were finished.