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Journal of Coastal Research

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Journal of Coastal Research: Special Issue 54 - Geologic and Environmental Dynamics of the Pontchartrain Basin [FitzGerald & Reed]: 206-224. 2009
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.2112/SI54-004.1

The MRGO Navigation Project: A Massive Human-Induced Environmental, Economic, and Storm Disaster

Gary P. Shaffer^†, John W. Day Jr^‡, Sarah Mack^§, G. Paul Kemp^††, Ivor van Heerden^‡‡, Michael A. Poirrier^§§, Karen A. Westphal^†††, Duncan FitzGerald^‡‡‡, Andrew Milanes^§§§, Chad A. Morris^††††, Robert Bea^‡‡‡‡, and P. Shea Penland^†††

^†Department of Biological Sciences, SLU-10736, Southeastern Louisiana University, Hammond, LA 70402, U.S.A. shafe@selu.edu

^‡Department of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, U.S.A.

^§Department of Environmental Health Sciences Tulane University 1440 Canal Street, New Orleans, LA 70112, U.S.A.

^††National Audubon Society 6160 Perkins Road, Suite 215, Baton Rouge, LA 70808, U.S.A.

^‡‡Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA 70803, U.S.A.

^§§Department of Biological Sciences University of New Orleans 2000 Lakeshore Drive, New Orleans, LA 70148, U.S.A.

^†††Pontchartrain Institute, University of New Orleans, 2000 Lakeshore Drive, New Orleans, LA 70148, U.S.A.

^‡‡‡Department of Earth Sciences Boston University 675 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA 02215, U.S.A.

^§§§Environmental Science Services, Inc., P.O. Box 1289, Denham Springs, LA 70727-1289, U.S.A.

^††††CMor Consulting LLC, 545 Shady Lake Parkway, Baton Rouge, LA 70810, U.S.A.

^‡‡‡‡Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering 212 McLaughlin Hall University of California Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, U.S.A.

Abstract

It is generally felt in the water resources community that the most significant twenty-first century public works projects will be those undertaken to correct environmental damage caused by twentieth century projects. A second axiom is that the switch from economic development to restoration and mitigation, what we call redemption, often will be precipitated by disaster. Finally, it must be expected that the repair project will cost far more than the initial public investment but also may have economic revitalization potential far exceeding anticipated environmental benefits. We examine this cycle for the federally funded Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO) navigation project east of New Orleans, beginning with its much heralded birth in 1963 as a 122 km long free-flowing tidal canal connecting New Orleans to the Gulf of Mexico and ending with its recent de-authorization and closure. We track the direct and indirect effects of the project through its commercial failure, and then on to the official denial, the pervasive environmental impacts, and finally exposure of its role in flooding New Orleans during Hurricane Betsy in 1965 and more seriously during Hurricane Katrina in 2005. Post de-authorization planning to curtail continuing environmental and economic damage now offers an opportunity to apply lessons that have been learned and to reinstate natural processes that were disrupted or interrupted by the MRGO during the half-century of its operation. One surprising outcome is that the restoration program may turn out to be more commercially successful than the original navigation project, which was conceived as an agent of economic transformation. The U.S. Army Core of Engineers still does not acknowledge, even in the face of compelling scientific evidence, that the MRGO project was a significant cause of early and catastrophic flooding of the Upper and Lower 9th Wards, St. Bernard Parish, and New Orleans East during Hurricane Katrina. A modeling effort that removed the MRGO from the landscape, and restored the cypress swamps and marshes killed by the MRGO, reduced flooding from Hurricane Katrina by 80%. We conclude that the MRGO spelled the difference between localized flooding, and the catastrophe that killed 1464 people and inflicted tens of billions of dollars of property damages. If the MRGO-caused economic damages associated with Hurricanes Betsy and Katrina are combined with those of construction, operation and maintenance, and wetlands destroyed, then the total economic cost of the MRGO is in the hundreds of billions of dollars.

Published: September 2009

Keywords: Mississippi River Gulf Outlet, Hurricane Katrina, baldcypress, hurricane buffer, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, environmental disaster, saltwater intrusion, dead zone, storm impacts

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