 |
Flood Control in New Orleans By Matthew Nier |
| Main Page | The
U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has been involved in the control of the
Mississippi River and in particular the lower Mississippi River, in
the New
Orleans area, for the last 202 years. The flood control in the
New Orleans area of the lower Mississippi is in complete control of
the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The New Orleans District
covers the entire southern half of the state of Louisiana.
There are over 2,800 miles of water way that the Corps of
Engineers-New Orleans division is in charge of maintaining.
This is a huge undertaking that involves a lot of time, money, and
energy to do. If there was no up keep of the New Orleans
District, the Mississippi River would flood every year and change
course over time, just like it did before the control began 202
years ago. New Orleans has a population of about 500,000
people, and that does not include the surrounding area. So
without the control of the Mississippi River, it would displace and
kill numbers of people every year and make it impossible to live
down there. |