For discussion:
Hastert Questions Rebuilding New Orleans
WASHINGTON -- It makes no sense to spend billions of dollars to rebuild a city that's seven feet under sea level, House Speaker Dennis Hastert said of federal assistance for hurricane-devastated New Orleans.
"It looks like a lot of that place could be bulldozed," the Illinois Republican said in an interview about New Orleans Wednesday with the Daily Herald of Arlington Heights, Ill.
Hastert later issued a statement saying he was not "advocating that the city be abandoned or relocated."
From what I've read, there are serious doubts about whether or not New Orleans can ever be made safe from severe hurricanes. The levee system seems to be a hodge-podge of improvisation. The remaining wetlands should never have been developed at all.
One might ask a similar question about the Hotel Zone of Cancun, where I live.
My family and I were living in nearby Puerto Morelos when Category Five Hurricane Gilbert made landfall in a direct hit in 1988. Cancun's hotels are built to withstand a Category Five hurricane. Not a single hotel was destroyed and some even operated throughout the storm. Even the areas that are built on fill and are below sea level, such as where we now live on an island in the lagoon formed by the main island, came through Gilbert with minor damage. Only a few windows were broken -- all on the ground floor (which did flood).
But the the real answer is that the Hotel Zone is an expendable entertainment district that can be rapidly evacuated in case of an emergency. Very few people live out here. The Hotel Zone produces such immense profits that rebuilding it would probably not be a major economic problem even if much of it were destroyed.
The city of Cancun (about 700,000 population) is on the mainland. Almost all houses are constructed of concrete block framed out in steel-reinforced concrete and covered with at least an inch of concrete stucco. The roofs are made of various concrete materials, including very durable steel reinforced beams. This is true even in the poorer sections, except for some marginal sections that have traditional Yucatecan huano or zacate palm thatch and wooden hand-tied post-and-beam houses. Some well-to-do people prefer living in the traditional houses.
Many of the poor people's houses have tarpaper roofs. These do fly off in hurricanes, but the palm thatch house survive surprisingly well. See our old house in Puerto Morelos for an example. As you will see, the palapa (palm thatch) roof came through the eye of the hurricane just fine. It did not lose a single huano palm leaf, although the structure inclined 5 cm. The walls had not yet been installed, but they would have done just fine, too, judging by the smaller shelter you can see on the right. This little house, which was my daughter's bedroom, did lose its roof covering because it was made of a lighter palm leaf called x'it (now a protected species).
Almost all of mainland Cancun is well above sea level. From what I understand, most of New Orleans is well below sea level. I think that Hastert is asking a very proper (if perhaps ill-timed) question.
What do you all think?
