Live from the Nuke Free Zone

It has created as close to a blank slate as we get in human affairs…

David Brooks, on planning the new New Orleans. As someone interested in urban planning, and a great believer in the power of cities to provide opportunities and resources not found elsewhere, the idea struck a powerful chord in me.

Power is on. The pumps are running. Part of the city is dry and other parts will be soon. We know at least some of what to do to make the city safer. A half-million people have engaged in a nationwide diaspora, leaving behind a port city with its infrastructure at least partly intact. We must not rush to rebuild before knowing that it will be safe and worth the investment, but unless astonishing levels of pollutants are left behind to make the land unfit for habitation, a new town will grow again whether the state and nation deliberately choose to rebuild New Orleans or people aggregate on unclaimed land, especially if property ownership in the French Quarter is preserved. (I suppose it’s possible the place will be evacuated, declared a disaster area, and then declared a national park or memorial of some kind. But I bet not.)

When Mr. Brooks is on, he’s on. There are some interesting ideas with tackling urban poverty in his article, especially in the idea that it’s important (and economically worthwhile to a city) to break up concentrated zones of urban poverty. The Gautreaux program he mentions is one look at this urban development philosophy — head to Governing magazine’s website for another. Seek down to “Public Housing’s Dilemma” on that page for an account of an attempt at the same thing that backfired, and consider what lessons can be learned.

The residents of at least one part of New Orleans want to stay, but many of their neighbors will probably put down roots in the cities where they are living now. A city of a half-million people will not be in place by this time next year, nor will it at any time develop overnight. The most likely scenario I see for rebuilding New Orleans starts with a core of devotees, perhaps no more than 10,000, that fiercely cling to every scrap of their city and return there as soon as they can, with the rest of the city being slowly either reclaimed or razed for renewal. And with renewal will come opportunity. Opportunity to learn from the past, correct mistakes, and do it right.

City.