New Orleans Geology

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        The city of New Orleans is known by all for its colorful culture and heritage.  This culture includes the crazy holiday of Mardi Gras, always partying Bourbon Street, and the beautiful and historical French Quarter.  The French Quarter is the oldest and most famous neighborhood in the entire city of New Orleans.  It being the most populated city in the state of Louisiana brings people on its own but all of these parts of the city are the major tourist attractions that bring millions of people each year.  Any of the restaurants available have their own specialties with Cajun flavors added in for that extra spice that is to die for.  The city is also known for its extensive levee system which is a necessity to have present and working correctly due to the fact that most of the city is below sea level.  If you were to look at a map of the city its self you would find the entire city forms a bowl shape with one side against the Mississippi River and the other side against Lake Pontchartrain, hence the nickname the Crescent City because it resembles the shape of a crescent moon.  The other well known nicknames of New Orleans is the Big Easy because it is slower and more easy going than the Big Apple’s constant fast pace.

        New Orleans was built at the southern most point of the Mississippi River to be used as a major shipping port.  The city was originally founded in 1817 by the French Mississippi Company.  The leader of the expedition who is credited with the discovery was Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville.  It was built at this location to be used as a trade and shipping post because of its access to the Mississippi River which spans more than 2,300 miles north. The river was perfect for shipping because once the ships crossed the Atlantic Ocean, instead of having to travel west by land, they could just continue their sailing straight into the Gulf of Mexico, stop in New Orleans to resupply and continue up the river with no detour needed. Once on the river, the ship’s captain would not have to worry about running a ground because it is very deep and over a mile wide in some parts.  The shipping port was, and still is busy today with ships constantly moving up and down the Mississippi River.  The port in New Orleans is in the top 10 busiest ports in the United States and within the top 75 busiest ports in the entire world (American Association of Port Activities (AAPA), 2009).  This results in major economic activity within the city and also brings in extra tourists through cruise lines.      

On the Louisiana coastline in New Orleans erosion has recently become a major problem in the within the past decade.  There are many reasons for this including the construction of levees within the Mississippi River which has caused the sediment buildup to slow down dramatically which, in turn, results in receding riverbanks along the river.  The levees also have caused salt water to replace the fresh water habitats which, in turn, eventually kill all the trees and other vegetation around the river that were once used to prevent the erosion from occurring in the first place.  With all the trees and vegetation gone there is nothing to block the wind from swirling up the water and making waves pound the shorelines causing even more damage to the riverbanks (Stewart, R., 2005).  The levees also have led to the rapid destruction of the wetlands surrounding New Orleans and Louisiana in general.  These decayed wetlands acted as buffer zones protecting the city.  Another major problem which causes easy erosion in New Orleans is that the entire coastline is made up of easily eroded materials such as clays and silts.  Over time these materials are broken apart and are deposited somewhere else which will eventually leave the coastline with no protection left.

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Houses and other buildings close to the shoreline are at a huge risk of being lost due to erosion of the land around them.  The waters just pound the coast line pushing it further and further back until the house or building could eventually collapse into the water.  This situation could actually be prevented using erosion and sediment control techniques such as gabion walls.  A gabion wall is basically a retaining wall made out of heavy duty galvanized wire boxes that are filled with stone or stand and then are stacked in tiers that follow the slope that they are ...

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