New Orleans a Year Later

After the Katrina disaster, I challenged a widely-distributed email critique of the people trapped in New Orleans at the Convention Center and the Superdome. Brisbane folk had been quite civil when this place flooded in 1974 and the writer found the behavior of New Orleans citizens, "minorities" in particular, to be shameful and a sign of the decline of Western civilization.

I argued that the situations were not comparable. Now it turns out that the horrifying reports of civil unrest among the flood victims were wrong. Despite the appalling conditions that existed there a little more than a year ago, only one violent death at those locations has been confirmed and it was a suicide. “People comported themselves with patience, with generosity toward those with even less, and with as much dignity as they could manage,” writes John Biguenet in an Aug. 20 New York Times web journal article.

Nearly everything we think we know about what happened in New Orleans after Katrina, he says, is probably wrong.

About 1,300 New Orleanians, about half white and half black, died from drowning, dehydration, and/or exposure within a week, but they were not victims of a natural disaster, he says. Other areas took the brunt of the storm and parts of New Orleans that would soon flood were high and dry after the storm had passed.

Katrina itself didn’t kill those people, Biguenet argues, citing the draft final report of the U. S. Corps of Engineers, in which the Corps admits: “foundation failures occurred prior to water levels reaching the design levels of protection, causing breaching and subsequent massive flooding and extensive losses.”

Only parts of New Orleans is below sea level. Biguenet and his wife own a house that sits a foot above sea level, but his neighborhood now floods uncharacteristically after rains. Why? The Corps of Engineers has, since the hurricane, plugged up a drainage canal, reducing drastically its ability to carry away water.

One thing most of us are probably right about? FEMA functioned terribly. The little horror story at the end of Biguenet’s report is well worth reading in the Aug. 20, 2006, New York Times.

Green Bridge Middle Closing Today...Hooray!

“Only four or five people a week will use it,” predicted a retired gentleman waiting on a park bench this morning to see the middle section of the St. Lucia-Dutton Park Green Bridge set into place, but he’s wrong. This suspension structure spanning the Brisbane River is coming together ahead of schedule and my wife and I will be among herds of folks using it several times a week as soon as it opens, perhaps before the end of the year.

A crane was in place this morning to lift a 3.6 meter mid-section piece into place and with that done, only a span over Sir William MacGregor Drive on the west end will be unconnected. Earlier this week the eastern end was linked to its approach ramp, so this $55.5 million (AU dollars) bridge for busses, walkers and bike peddlers is tantalizingly close to becoming useful.

What a joy it has been to see the two towers rise up out of the river over the past year and then to watch the decking spread bit by bit in both directions from each one. I have a few hundred digital photos of its progress and I think it's a beautiful structure.

A contest is underway now to name it, and one of the names being considered is “Green Bridge.” That would get my vote.

Another choice may be made by the officials, but this will always be the Green Bridge to me and, I suspect, to most of the rest of us who have watched it rise from the river. May it help keep UQ, St. Lucia, Dutton Park, Annerley, Fairfield, and the rest of Brisbane green and lively for many generations to come.