Bush administration says New Orleans could take 25 years to recover

[sabra]

http://www.klfy.com/Global/story.asp?S=4703950

Bush administration says New Orleans could take 25 years to recover

WASHINGTON The Bush administration's Gulf Coast recovery coordinator says a full recovery in New Orleans could take 25 years as homeowners, businesses and tourists are coaxed back to the city devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

White House coordinator Don Powell said in an interview with Associated Press that much of what's needed for the return of New Orleans' population is "out of our control," including housing, ensuring safety and robust investment by the private sector.

Powell says much of the economic rebirth hinges on flood maps that will set safety standards for rebuilding.

The four parishes that make up New Orleans and its immediate suburbs have been waiting for the Federal Emergency Management Agency to issue the flood maps for months. Powell says he expects FEMA to release the maps soon, but that the data largely is tied to new levee cost estimates that would nearly triple earlier projections for protecting the city.

[kurth]

1. Après moi, le déluge

[coalition_unwilling]

2. AKA: "That's for future presidents and future residents of NO to fix"

Jesus, we re-built Western Europe after 1945 in about 10 years. Now we're talking about one city?

[pitohui]

20. no we're not talking about one city actually

we're talking several cities and many towns from texas border to mississippi/alabama state border

nonetheless they need to do more than just sit on their thumbs and rotate, this is ridiculous

[Kikosexy2]

3. Like Uuuhhh...

no shit...ShitHead(Bush)...and Chimpie doesn't makes thing any better for NOLA to begin with anyways....but thanks for heads up..like Iraq, NO will be left for future presidents to clean up...

[Benhurst]

4. It will take the nation longer than that to recover from Bush. NT

[GoddessOfGuinness]

22. That's the truth...

:(

[Whoa_Nelly]

5. Gonna take at least 25 years 'cuz we's looking at lettin' it flood

again and again and again and....

[bdamomma]

9. what a bunch of snakes

these thugs are, screwed up Iraq, and say let another President handle it, screw up the Gulf states and let someone else take care of it, where did people get the idea that this president can protect those sheeple, geez, that's it guys we are on our own, while they pickpocket each of us. Disgusting.

[Whoa_Nelly]

18. Welcome to DU, alyce douglas!

:hi:

..and really...don't hold back on your feelings for these thugs :D

[demosincebirth]

6. Thats only if its not hit by another Hurricane and chances are

slim that its not.

[henslee]

7. yeah, 25 years to recover from a Bush Administration.

[DUHandle]

8. That seems pretty ambitious

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Orleans#History


It took a long time for New Orleans to get to where it was - 25 years doesn't seem the least bit realistic.

[noonwitch]

10. Hey, but we might be out of Iraq by then!

That's when we'll be able to afford to take care of our own people.

[fshrink]

11. About the same time it will take this country to recover

from the Idiot's administration. At best.

[Virginia Dare]

12. Unless it gets hit by another major hurricane in the meantime..

hell, it won't even take a major one this year. The levees won't even hold back a "2". Party on, Chimpy.

:grr:

[Canuckistanian]

13. Is that the contractor's estimate?

First they grossly overestimate the time. Then they overbill. Then there are cost overruns.

This ain't gonna be cheap.

[DUHandle]

15. Charging $1000 for labor

on under 30 minutes work installing tarps with the tarps provided by free by the feds ain't helping one bit.

[Dogmudgeon]

14. ... or FIVE if the Democrats return to power

--p!

[KamaAina]

16. It's not up to Bush**. It's up to us!

Here are a couple of places where New Orleanians, exiled and otherwise :-) , are getting together to reimagine the city without (obviously) any help from King Dumbass**:

http://disc.server.com/Indices/231355.html

http://nola.us

See if you can guess which poster is me :-)

Ominously, though, traffic at both has fallen off quite a bit in the last few weeks; hopefully it's just that people are getting back in and rolling up their sleeves rebuilding, which wouldn't necessary leave a lot of time for chatting on the boards...

[sinkingfeeling]

17. Too bad idiot boy wasn't so slow in invading Iraq! Man, I wonder

what he'd do in an emergency....oh, I remember he stares into space and reads "My Pet Goat". Never mind.

[pitohui]

19. the bigotry of low expectations, anyone?

i'm tired of their shit, they need to fix the goddamn levees and stop making excuses

[MasonJar]

21. It is going to take more than that for our country and the entire

planet to recover from the Bush policies.

[Nickster]

23. 4 fiscal years for the Marshall Plan and 25 years for Dubya???

What's wrong with that picture?

[Lisa]

24. some interesting stuff on the rebuilding of San Francisco after 1906 ...

It looks like they were more organized than Bush and Co., when it came to re-housing the survivors!

"The camps had a peak population of 16,448 people, but by 1907 most people had moved out of the camps, which were then re-used as garages, storage spaces or shops."


http://www.answers.com/topic/1906-san-francisco-earthquake
http://www.sfmuseum.org/1906/rebuild.html

And other disasters ...

"Chicago: After the Great Fire destroyed 18,000 buildings and left 100,000 homeless (one in three residents), rebuilding in the "Burnt District" began almost immediately. Debris was pushed into Lake Michigan as landfill for a bigger city. The size of the central business district doubled, and taller buildings were constructed."

http://www.usatoday.com/news/nation/2006-02-09-usa-rebuild_x.htm

[Vidar]

25. The Marshall Plan rebuilt Europe in about 8 years. Bush couldn't

even rebuild his pig farm in a 100. No surprise here. Designate more cronies. Embezzle more taxes. Carry on.

[recidivist]

26. Why rebuild at all? Denny Hastert was right.

Hastert committed the classic political blunder of speaking the truth too soon, but he was entirely correct when he said we'd be crazy to rebuild those parts of NO below sea level. The longer we drift along with nothing being done, the clearer that becomes.

To be sure, a few things DO need to be rebuilt. The Port of New Orleans is important and was back in operation in a matter of days. I gather that the oil and gas operations are still repairing a lot of damage, but most of that capacity is also back online. IOW, the economically important, location-dependent things in and around NO are humming along.

To be blunt about it, what really NEEDS to be rebuilt already has been.

The reason we're spinning our wheels about the rest is that it is abundantly clear that it's damned stupid to rebuild below sea level; the insurance industry won't touch it without guarantees; there's really no way to guarantee new levees if the next storm is big enough; and the only entity even remotely willing to waste money on all this is Uncle Sucker, i.e. you and me.

I'm not picking on NO here. As we've moved to a service dominated economy, most businesses, jobs, and residences are no longer really location dependent. The Taco Bells, strip malls, and housing developments can be just about anywhere. That's true in any major city, not just NO. If a natural disaster levelled Philadelphia, Indianapolis, or Cleveland, would we rebuild THOSE cities back to the same size and same pattern? Of course not. We'd clear the ground and rebuild what makes sense under modern conditions.

In NO, it makes no sense to rebuild a disaster-waiting-to-happen. Rebuild on higher ground. If that means most of the people move elsewhere and NO downsizes to a city of 100,000, there's nothing wrong with that.

[leesa]

27. It'll take these jokers that long just to get a death toll