If not tens of billions, at least teens of billions.
Note: I heard the person on TV that was part of the commission that made the original suggestion to Congress in 1998, so I went searching for it. Remember, these were 1998 dollars, so today’s cost is fast approaching $20 billion.
To be perfectly honest, I found another cite that said it could be done for $1 billion over 30 years. It didn’t seem very credible to me, though.
Another figure I heard this evening is that it’s going to cost $10.6 billion to rebuid NO. (I’ve always wondered how they come up with that “.6” part when we’re talking such astronomical and abstract numbers, but that’s beside the point.)
Further, I heard that it’s costing half a billion dollars per day for the relief effort, but never mind that.
The initial estimates for the total cost of the destruction everywhere due to Katrina was $26 billion.
My most recent post above estimates the cost to rebuild NO to the degree that it could withstand a Cat 5 hurricane is $16 Billion.
(I should explain here, since I didn’t before, that the gentleman on TV that originally estimated the $16B included new levees and flood management gates for Lake Pontchartrain as well as wetlands restoration.)
If we’re to believe that, and the numbers are anywhere accurate, then we’re forced to say,
“Mississippi and Alabama, you’ll get nothing and like it. New Orleans has already used up the $26.6 billion we allowed for everything.”
Of course, what it really means is that the initial estimates were way too low.
I’ll buy that, but will AL and MS when the lion’s share of the money that could be spent to bring their cities back together gets earmarked to rebuild a 100 square mile sunken latrine on a flood plain?
From your link:
They’re not talking about ringing the city with a levee to protect it. They’re talking about something quite a bit different and on what appears to be a larger scale. I fear that I don’t quite understand the connection here; it appears to me to be sort of a non sequiter which neither supports nor casts doubt on either of our respective positions on the topic.
However, if it was the same sort of plan, I still don’t want to debate numbers any further. It just no longer seems wise unless I’m willing to devote time and effort to detailed study of the issue.
Excellent! I will take $1 at 10,000 to one odds. What you need to do is find a 100 mile vacant tract of government owned land immediately adjacent to the Mississippi in either Louisiana or Mississippi (any further North and your into other cities like Memphis.
Metairie, Slidell, St. Gabriel, Amite, Baton Rouge, New Roads, Innis, Bunke, marksville, Woodville, Meadville, Alexandria, Jonesville, Natchez, St. Joseph, Crystal Springs, Tallulah, Vicksburg, Jackson, Delhi, Monroe, Lake Providence, etc etc all line the Mississippi contiguously so good luck! When you give up, I’ll tell you where to send the check.
The land is toxic? You have a cite for this?
So sayeth you, but you’re a moron.
There’s no justification necessary. They will come because there is opportunity that is not being serviced.
I wasn’t aware that the Army Corps of Engineers provided longshoreman services, storage, transportation, rail, and trucking services.
Highest use is a concept for valuing real estate. It’s the reason why you don’t have a lot of U store it franchises on Park Avenue in New York. What it means simply is that land will tend to be used for it what it can most profitably be used for.
That’s not what I said.
No. A small agricultural community is unlikely to be located at a transportation hub where rails, Interstates, airports, other roads, Pipelines, Storage etc are all located. If it were, then it would not be a small agricultural community. To create a NOLA there you need to get all the rails, utilities, roads, etc, etc to connect with it. It also needs to be at a logical site that is efficient for shipping so you are not sending goods and services out of their at great expense. NOLA is uniquely located with the benefits of deep water shipping, extensive rail and road service, pipeline service, air service, and just happens to be at the juncture of a major East/West, North South transportation route. It has all the benefits of a land juncture and a sea port.
You need to alter the routes from their destinations and sources. NOLA ships everywhere and exists at a natural four way juncture. You can’t move that juncture without altering all the arteries that connect to it and they go for thousands of miles.
No. I see your idiocy. There’s no contradiction there. If old NOLA were unsalvageable. It could be razed and a new city constructed on the cite without anything being salvaged.
Occasionally fucked up. Not particularly dangerous.
When was the last time you saw a container ship sailing up the Rockies?
No. I never said that, and you’re a moron for suggesting it. The fact that NOLA is below sea level does not mean that it occupies the lowest point for drainage purposes. NOLA proper is on a fucking hill surrounded by lower marshland. The water drains into the Marshes which are lower than NOLA. Previous to this hurricane this natural draining was impeded by the levees so the water must be pumped out over the levees.
Your saying it doesn’t make it true. Once it’s drained and the electricity is on, people will start coming back. They always do.
Of all your arguments, this one is the most stupid. The fact that it’s been explained to you several times without you getting it, is pretty much proof that I’m dealing with a retard. I explained this to my five year old as a test of this thesis and she got it right away.
I’ll try one more time. You do not need to construct a road with a twenty degree grade to get over a hill with a twenty degree grade. You can:
A. Construct a road with a five degree grade and start it four times further away.
B. Run a road at a right angle to the direct route at a five degree grade and make switchbacks until you reach the top
C. Construct a clover leaf
D. Construct a skyway
E. Doing something else any idiot can think of.
We have learned to construct roads over hills. I know you doubt this technology and it must seem like magic to a person of your intellect, but I assure that it’s true. We have mastered the art of it, and are able to construct roads of usable grade over all sorts of obstacles.
I have even heard a rumor that we’ve developed a new kind of road that enables us to cross obstacles like water (as hard as that is to believe). They call it a “bridge.” They can be built over all sorts of things that are otherwise difficult to cross. Perhaps you’ve heard of them.
The notion of moving a city of a million people or so is idiotic. Hastert is an idiot.
First of all, New Orleans is important as a port city. It’s hard to be a port city when you’re inland. The port is not going away.
Second, a very large chunk of the infrastructure of New Orleans is fairly easily recoverable. Even if every home in the city had to be demolished and rebuilt, there are still roads, sewers, power lines, sidewalks, high rises, factories, freeways, interstate highways…
Plus the land has already been prepped, leveled, feeders for sewage, water and power are at each lot, etc.
If you had to totally rebuild 50,000 homes at a cost of 100,000 per home, that’s only 5 billion dollars. Even if reconstruction is 10 times that much, it’s gotta be an order of magnitude cheaper than building an entire city from scratch in the middle of nowhere. Assuming there was a ‘nowhere’ that was available for building a city…
If New Orleans isn’t rebuilt, they aren’t going to build a new one somehere else. The population will just drift away and build homes elsewhere. But that’s not going to happen. The port is necessary. So the levees will be repaired, and the city will eventually open again.
The question is, what kind of city will it be? I wouldn’t be surprised to see a permanent population drop of at least 20%. That, along with increased insurance costs and the new perception of risk will probably depress real estate values, to the point where it’s very cheap to buy and build there. That will attract people back in, as long as there are jobs for them.
New Orleans will go on. It just may not look much like the old one.
I’ve countered your pathetic arguments over and over again. You’re simply not worth the time anymore. There are other, more interesting things to do on this board than waste time trying to educate you.
You, sir, are a fool. A rose-colored, Queen of Denial, fool.
And I didn’t give you permission to leave your hutch.
:::SMACK:::
Now get back in there.
You’ve offered me odds on a bet. I’ve taken you up on it. Now you need to follow through, or else you are a welcher.
Where will you locate your new city?
That truth seems ridiculously hard for some people to grasp.
God, that’s just sad. This is why I just went straight to abuse with you. You’re just to dim to see reason.
Seriously, you guys are still responding to this moron? Apologies to morons. It was the first descriptor that came to me. At least morons seem to keep their shit off themselves when they start typing.
The population of New Orleans is just under 500,000.
http://neworleans.areaconnect.com/statistics.htm
Let’s say building a system of Levees costs $14 billion. (I’m not an engineer, so I can pretend that this is a real number, which it isn’t). That works out to about $28,000 per person. Say a working lifetime is about 45 years: I get something over $640/ yr.
Expensive. But not implausibly so. And I’m ignoring the port, benefits to nonresidents, etc.
We can salvage the rubble to create fill, raising the level of the city.
Or not? 
Wow! MS and AL aren’t going to get a dime for releif efforts? I’ll need a cite for that load of shit. But if you happen to show me that those 2 states are going to have to go it alone, I’ll lead the armed charge on Washington.
I’m pretty sure threatening armed insurrection against the government is frowned upon on this board. 
I’m really quite tired right now, and answer to this and much more of your nonsense will follow. Maybe not tonight, but by tomorrow at least.
Let it suffice for now to say that, when I do post a response, and it will be lengthy, when it’s done, you will be proven, beyond any doubt, to be quite stupid (but that should be obvious already), and, more importantly than that, a liar.
That’s right, a liar. You stated facts that you either knew, or should’ve known, were false.
I’ll give you this opportunity to retract everything you’ve said and request this thread be closed.
Failing that, since you stated a monetary amount, I want it doubled.
Still wish to continue?
Wow, I’ve read Scylla’s previous rants. I think we’re looking at the setup for the mother of them all. I’ll bring the beer. Now we need popcorn, brats and burgers covered. Come one, come all, and bring the food! This is going to be interesting.
Is this what you’ll be telling Ricardo Montalban when the plane lands and Tattoo shows you to your quarters.
And you’ve uncovered them. What a shameful moment for me that will be once you fulfill your promise and reveal my true nature for all to see and ridicule.
That’s very gentlemanly of you to offer me a way out like that now that you have me dead to rights and I’m about to suffer your righteous wrath. On the other hand, I do need a good ass-kicking.
The novelty of losing a debate to somebody like you, who’s highest possible intellectual calling is to crawl into the landscaping and become fertilizer is certainly worth anticipating.
So, no. Go to it. I can’t wait.
Wow. Now I’m scared. You want me to double my bet and risk two whole dollars? Before I accept, where will you come up with the 20k to cover your side of the bet?
Good heavens, man. Give it a rest. You have been soundly defeated in this thread. Best move on to more constructive pursuits.
Then again, I do enjoy some good schadenfreude now and then…never mind! You post on and show Scylla who’s boss!
Yes. Yes you are quite tired. And tiring. I’m sure this is the first and only statement in this thread that people will take you at face value.
cough Well, actually…
I’m sitting here looking through my DeLorme’s Louisiana atlas and gazetteer, and while I’m not familiar with the area, being from Illinois where the big water stays in Lake Decatur…
On pages 36 and 37, there’s what looks like a 10-mile by 10-mile chunk of land on the east bank, in a triangle formed by St. Francisville, Jackson, and Lindsay. The terrain looks, if not hilly, then at least not “Mississippi river bottom flat”. You could put a city there, dig some shipping canals to connect it more closely with the river. It’s not “government land”, but with eminent domain, all land is potentially “government land”.
Just a devil’s advocate kind of thought… 