FEMA travel trailers and the bigger ones.

[Tom Horne]

THE CLUE PHONE IS RINGING AND IT'S FOR YOU. It is not now and it never was the responsibility of the US Army Corps of Engineers to maintain the levees that hold the water out of New Orleans. That responsibility lies with local flood control or levee boards. Those insular special purpose boards are notoriously corrupt and often serve as an employer of last resort for the ne'er do well relatives of LOCAL POLITICIANS. It was the local levee authority of New Orleans that refused the construction of flood gates for the cities canals because they did not want to bare the cost of maintaining them. All of the levee failures occurred on those same canals. Had the flood gates been installed as the corps had originally planned the flooding of the city would not have occurred. The Corps is supervising the reconstruction of the levees because the levee boards do not have the project management capabilities and they would divert far too much of the construction funds to other uses.

[John]

Levee repairs and improvements in New Orleans and nearby have been stalled for years, mainly due to local interests using the courts to prevent the Army Corps of Engineers from doing anything.

[digitalmaster]

We have no obligation to the have little or have nots...We do have a responsibility to those who cannot. I work with a man who had polio as a child.One leg is pactically useless and is in a brace...yet he climbs down in ditches to weld pipe..and climbs ladders..and crawls around in tunnels...and on high steel structures to do his job.It is hard physical and mental work. While some of the "have nots" wont even mop floors, not because they can't...but because they think it is beneath them.I do not owe them ANYTHING.

[ameijers]

I tend to agree- give humane levels of aid, conditional on moving above sea level. The N.O. disaster was no suprise- see this spookily accurate 'what if' article from July 05:

Keep the port in operation, because there is nothing to replace it. The non-flooded areas can make it as a historical tourist destination. The non-historical low-lying areas- if someone has the money to rebuild on land they own- fine, let them, but with a signed 'at your own risk' waiver, and no flood insurance or federally guaranteed loans. For the others- offer an above-CURRENT- market-value buyout, to move elsewhere, above sea level. Another city, maybe 'New' New Orleans, on the north side of the big bridge. Sometimes life sucks, and the government should make sure nobody starves. But there is no obligation to restore the status quo ante. My family lost everything in WWII, and started over on this side of the pond. I own a house in Lake Charles, on the other end of the state, which also got nailed, thankfully not as bad. But it is above seal level, at least a little, and only had minor damage. If it had gotten destroyed, I wouldn't expect the taxpayers to replace it- that is why I have insurance.

aem sends...

[mm]

I appreciate that your addressing my post, and in the process showing twfsa that there are construction issues here.

Well if they are going to rebuild that block, they'll have to replace the utilities anyhow.

Tie downs? Such? I don't remember seeing tie downs when I've seen such things. But if they have to be tied down, why not in front of the ruins of their old home.

Again, the trailers won't help them evacuate, but that is not the purpose of trailers. It's to give them some place to live. For people who are going to rebuild, it's to give them someplace to live while they rebuild or at least clean up and do what they can, and keep away looters.

If another storm will ruin the trailers, aiui the trailers are getting ruined in storage. They could have been living in them all this time, and there hasn't been another storm.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[MC]

I would think they would require restrictions for rebuilding there, some kind of buy out and then not let residential buildings go up in the flood plain areas, only commercial building, parking, etc that can be built to withstand flooding and or levels raised above the flood levels.

[TURTLE]

this is Turtle.

The New Orleans Levee board deverted $2.5 Mil. from the levee funds to build a Mardi Gras Fountain in Jackson Square. they must think putting a fountain in the center of town will hold back the water from the hurrican.

The New Orleans Levee Board received $60 Mil. in the last 5 years to improve the levee. They can't find $30 Mil. of it and the Federal Government is asking for it back. The other $30 mil. went to advisers and fake company that are not in business any more.

There has been no improvements of the levee in the last 5 years and was been given $60 Mil. to do so. Not a penny went to improvement of the levee.

Do a Favor for the Mayor and you get a site on the New Orleans Levee Board at a Salary of $90K a year.

TURTLE

[HeyBub]

Uh, no. If all the ice in the Arctic Ocean melted, the sea level would rise exactly 0.00 feet. Some ice is melting. Glaciers, however, in some parts of the world are growing. It's called climate.

New Orleans is the third largest port (tonnage) in the nation. Virtually all of the midwest grain harvest moves through the port. New Orleans cannot be moved. As for "raising" the city by rail-car loads of dirt, a quick back-of-the-envelope calculation shows that all the coal ever moved from Montanta - by rail, for fifty years - wouldn't even come close.

I'd go back to the designs from the '50s for underwater cities. It'd be cheaper.

[Nick Hull]

C Tent. Makes a fine temporary home, much cheaper than a trailer.

[hallerb]

<

The New Orleans Levee board deverted $2.5 Mil. from the levee funds to build a Mardi Gras Fountain in Jackson Square. they must think putting a fountain in the center of town will hold back the water from the hurrican.

The New Orleans Levee Board received $60 Mil. in the last 5 years to improve the levee. They can&#39;t find $30 Mil. of it and the Federal Government is asking for it back. The other $30 mil. went to advisers and fake company that are not in business any more.

There has been no improvements of the levee in the last 5 years and was

been given $60 Mil. to do so. Not a penny went to improvement of the levee.

Do a Favor for the Mayor and you get a site on the New Orleans Levee Board at a Salary of $90K a year.

TURTLE >

Yeah STUPID WASTE is here too, in pittsburgh they want to build a light rail line under the river, a pure waste of money and completely unneeded.

money should go directly to corpos of engineers, not to build a fountain or other wastes

[dirt farmer]

Are the units on towable trailors? Can I back my truck up to one, hook it up and tow one out of there? If so, when&#39;s the auction? I&#39;ll take two please.

[larry]

According to the national news reports, FEMA will pay to have them cut up and removed. They are mired in mud and the frames are bent beyond repair.

Folks, pay attention! We as a country are going to be in bad shape if we succeed in moving all emergency services to/under government control. I served as a volunteer fireman in my younger years and I&#39;m appalled to see what now passes as firefighting. In the past year I have seen minor house fires that became total loses while the paperwork and protocol was completed before the first hose was pulled off the truck. $3000 for a residential fire suppression sprinkler system is a damn good investment around here.

-larry / dallas

[mm]

I wasn&#39;t intending this to be about politics, only about trailer technology.

But since a couple people complained so much about the whole levee notion, let me remind everyone that although these other places are not below absolute sea level, there are many places that are below flood level and depend on levees.

This includes downtown Dallas, downtown Indianapolis, and probably lots of cities I haven&#39;t been to. (I&#39;ve seen the Dallas and Indy levees with my own eyes. I konw what kind of flloding there was in Indy periodically before the levees were build, and would be again if one failed.)

Also in most places all along the Mississippi, and many places along the, Ohio, Missouri and probably other rivers. Also, Swartzennegger pointed out today on TV that there are loads of levees in California and many were built more than 100 years ago by farmers, and no one knows what they were built with.

Plus Chicago&#39;s first floor may be above the level of the lake and the Chicago river, but its basements aren&#39;t.

These are only the levees and flooding issues I I know about. I&#39;m sure there are many many more. No one stops people from living in these places that will flood if the levees break.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[Goedjn]

It&#39;s not that people live below sea-level that pisses me off. It&#39;s that I&#39;m expected to pay for it.

[Frank Boettcher]

The trailers that were initially supplied by FEMA were actual travel trailers that they bought from dealers and are meant to be towed as a way of life.

The second wave of trailers are trailers that were made to FEMA&#39;s specifications. They are not nearly as well made and I think will fall apart if they are moved very far. They were meant to be put in place and provide a home in that one spot until no longer needed. They don&#39;t have waste holding tanks and are only meant to be hooked up to city sewage lines or a homeowners septic system.

[mm]

Thanks for the details. Nothing I saw included this.

Although if one can&#39;t hook up the trailer, there is a chance the toilet in the house might work, and if it doesn&#39;t, one could get a chemical toilet and use that.

There may have been a lot of places below the flood plain where sewer hookups were impossible, but that&#39;s true above the floodplain also.

So far it sounds to me like FEMA should have waived its rule against this second wave of trailers beting set up below the flood plain on people&#39;s own plots of land. Instead of letting them rot in storage.

I"M not trying to blame one political party here, just a) bureaucracy, and b) the desire of many people to make rules and enforce them even in atypical situations. There are times when rules should be changed permanently, and situations when they should be waived.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[hallerb]

FEMA has made some changes!

[mm]

This is pretty informative. Thanks.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[mm]

But you pay for it in those other cass of repeated flooding and levee failing too.

Remove NOPSAM to email me. Please let me know if you have posted also.

[gfretwell]

Federal law requires tiedowns on all trailers in a coastal region ... for decades. Betsy in Loouisana was part of that thought process.

You still do not want trailers or any other new structure 20 feet below sea level. The whole idea that levees will save these people was proven WRONG. Don&#39;t even start talking about Amsterdam. It is a totally different situation. The geology is different and they don&#39;t have hurricanes. New Orleans is a swamp as is most of south Louisana. If they can&#39;t barge in enough dirt to get above sea level those houses should not be rebuilt. How many times are we willing to put these people behind the

8 ball? Bear in mind we are entering an increasing storm cycle and leaving the 30 year lull we had. The next 30 years will be more like the 30s, 40s and 50s, when big storms are frequent. Unfortunately a lot more people are living in the bullseye now.