Even some of the harshest critics of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are pleased by the swift rise of the $1.3-billion Inner Harbor Navigation Canal Lake Borgne Storm Surge Barrier. The 1.8-mile-long, 26-ft-high concrete and steel wall-and-gate structure going up at the confluence of the IHNC, the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway and the Mississippi River Gulf Outlet (MRGO) in New Orleans is designed to keep storm surge on Lake Borgne and the Gulf of Mexico away from the city’s eastern flank.
The wall crosses MRGO, whose deleterious effects on wetlands and levees were cited in U.S. District Court Judge Stanwood Duval Jr.’s much-publicized Nov. 18 ruling that blamed the Corp’s “negligent” operation and maintenance of the waterway for 2005’s flooding of a large part of New Orleans in Hurricane Katrina. The barrier, which the Corps says is its largest design-build, civil-works project ever, helps block MRGO and significantly strengthens flood protection in an area long called the city’s Achilles’ heel. Completion will help the Corps meet its deadline to bring the Greater New Orleans Hurricane and Storm Damage Risk Reduction System to 100-year levels of protection by June 2011.