The discussion about Katrina and NOLA made me wonder-the danger level of living in NOLA has to be pretty high-the city is below sea level, and a large hurricane could probably cause the levees to fail again. Now, living next to a nuclear power plant is probably orders of magnitude less risky-yet people worry about them. Is the perceived danger of both situations comparable? Or is NOLA much more dangerous?
Where’s the nuclear reactor? If the reactor is in New Orleans, then the primary danger of living in that location is flooding. If it’s in California, the primary danger is earthquakes. If it’s in Kansas, the primary danger is tornadoes. If it’s in Buffalo, the primary danger is blizzards. Anywhere you could put a nuclear reactor is going to have some local hazards or other, but those hazards aren’t going to be made any worse by the presence of the reactor.
Well…Fukushima serves as a proof-by-demonstration that the presence of a reactor can make a natural disaster far worse.
Personally, I’d bet the crime in NOLA is the biggest threat to people living there, not hurricanes or anything else.
It’s like the US Mos Eisely; you will never find the more wretched hive of scum and villainy.
Now that isn’t quite fair! 
I’m sure there are worse bars.
I’m sure there are more colorful places on the planet…
But I agree, hurricanes and being below sea level aren’t major threats in N.O.
And crime is bad, but not awful. It isn’t central america.
As for the OP, it is simply human nature. Nuclear power plants have a bad reputation. People oppose them just because it doesn’t immediately cost them anything to do so.
They certainly are safer then anything else people are likely to be exposed to on a daily basis. And people adjust. They may protest to keep one out of their neighborhood, but I doubt many if any people move away from one. Once it comes time to exert effort, people are pretty realistic.
Just like N.O., I wouldn’t live there (I live in the N.O. burbs), but if I did, I wouldn’t make the effort to move. Just be careful where I travel and look both ways at intersections.
As a New Orleans resident, the known risk has always been there, but how’s it different than living in the SFO Bay area? The shit’s gonna hit the fan at some time and we’re hoping we’ve been through the worst of it. Like San Francisco, Los Angeles, and New Orleans the areas are too well established and too important to just close the doors. Yeah, I pay high insurance to live here as do some of my fellow Louisiana residents for me to live here, but New Orleans is the most important city in the state.
Ralph, you have the knack for asking the most inexplicable-but-interesting questions on the SDMB.
If by “far worse” you mean “about 0.02%”.
What’s the value of the town and surrounding lands they had to abandon, stretched over 50 years?