I found a New York Times article about a plan for some coastal areas to build walls, levees and dike systems to protect them against strong hurricane storms. Hurricane Katrina forced houses off their foundation, and broke through their flood wall defense systems. In the aftermath of this tragedy, Congress has approved a $14 billion for a 350-mile long protection ring around the city. This protection would include stronger levees, and gigantic gates that could be closed against storms and a two- mile “great wall of Lake Borgne” that can seal off the canal that devastated the Lower Ninth Ward when the flood walls failed. There is more talk about a pumping system that will keep the cities three main drainage systems from being overwhelmed. The article said that even with these improved walls and pumping systems, the Crescent City will always suffer from flooding. While this is happening in New Orleans, it has come to the attention of other coastal areas that are vulnerable as part of a 50- year, $50 billion master plan, which combines structures such as levees with “green infrastructure”, like restored wet lands and bulked-up barrier islands. What happened with Hurricane Katrina pit into perspective how vulnerable some of our coastal areas are and how much work needs to be done. New York, New Jersey, Florida and Texas are looking at this plan, which is a multibillion dollar proposal to limit the damage that could be caused by the next major hurricane on the East Coast.
After reading this weeks lesson on the different structures that could be used to deplete the impact of coastal storms, I thought that this was a good article. This article shows that we are doing things for those areas that were hit hard by Hurricanes over the years. I think its amazing how expensive these plans and proposals are, but with how much destruction that they cause, the plans are worth it. Learning how the hard structures work, and how they are built, makes this article easier to understand for me. I think that there should have been more talk or collaboration for soft structures, and how they could also help.
Schwartz, J. (2015, August 7). How to Save a Sinking Coast? Katrina Created a Laboratory. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/08/science/louisiana-10-years-after-hurricane-katrina.html
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