(Via Donklephant) According to National Geographic, there may still be issues with the New Orleans levee system:
Almost a year ago the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers declared that it had restored New Orleans’ levees and floodwalls to pre-Hurricane Katrina strength.
But the system is actually riddled with flaws, and a storm even weaker than Katrina could breach the levees if it hit this year, say leading experts who have investigated the system.[...]
Bea found several areas where rainstorms have already eroded the newly rebuilt levees, particularly where they consist of a core of sandy and muddy soils topped with a cap of Mississippi clay.[...]
Even more troubling, water appears to be seeping under the stout new floodwall erected along the Industrial Canal to protect the Lower Ninth Ward.
If New Orleans’ turn comes again, and the levees don’t hold, I think a few folks will be asking about the sense of spending millions of dollars to protect a coastal city that sits below sea level.
Also, I’d think that protecting coastal cities from flooding is a subject that may attract more interest in coming years, if sea levels continue to rise. It’s all too easy to imagine the global economic shock that would happen, for example, if it were determined that New York City needed to be protected by levees due to rising sea levels…only to have those levees collapse a storm or two later.