Coogs win the "Kat-Rita Bowl"

It was a good weekend for the Houston Cougars, who currently have a winning record after beating the Tulane Green Wave 35-14 at Cajun Field in Lafayette, Louisiana. I had not planned on attending any UH road games this season, but once I discovered that the game would be played in Lafayette I decided to make a day trip to Acadiana. It was a journey through an area hit hard by Hurricane Rita just a couple of weeks ago to see a game that had to be relocated because of Hurricane Katrina, and I saw plenty of signs of both hurricanes' devastation.

I-10 east of Houston is a very congested highway right now, in both directions. It seemed that the majority of vehicles on the highway, even on the Texas side of the Sabine River, had Louisiana plates. There were lots of U-Haul and Budget rental trucks. Lots of trailers. Lots of pickups, SUVs and minivans packed with people and belongings. I wondered what all their stories were and where they were all going.  Some were probably returning to their homes (or what is left of their homes) in New Orleans (now that much of the city has reopened to residents) or other parts of Louisiana that were evacuated as Katrina / Rita approached. Others were probably going home only long enough to gather whatever they can salvage and return to what has over the past several weeks become their new homes. On the way back home, I passed somebody towing a mud-covered car that had obviously been underwater in New Orleans. I guess the vehicle had sentimental value to somebody.

Abandoned cars were everywhere alongside the highway. They had all been tagged for towing by Texas or Louisiana troopers, but I didn’t see any tow trucks actually removing any cars. They were probably the cars of Katrina and Rita evacuees which for whatever reason stopped working; as with all the people and belongings moving back and forth along the highway, I wondered about the stories behind all these abandoned cars as well.

The Ford Park special events complex just outside of Beaumont had been converted into an emergency logistics and distribution center, full of eighteen-wheelers, military vehicles and tents. Signs in front of the venue directed cars into lines for ice or drinking water distribution.

Things looked really bad between Beaumont and the Sabine River, where the eye of Rita moved across two weeks ago. I saw  two churches - one in Vidor, one in Orange - with their roofs completely ripped off. Trees were still laying on top of houses. I saw several piles of debris that used to be mobile homes, and many gas stations with their canopies torn away. Tarps over roofs were a common sight. Billboards were knocked down, highway signs were flipped over, and downed and splintered trees were everywhere. There were a lot of tree-trimming crews out along the interstate that day. I saw repairs being done to electrical lines as well. On the way to Lafayette, in fact, I passed a convoy of probably 20 electrical line trucks from Kansas.

Harrah's in Lake Charles is going to be out of commission for a while. Isle of Capri and the new L'Auberge du Lac, on the other hand, had just reopened and, from the number of cars in the Isle of Capri parking garage, appeared to be doing a brisk business. I didn't know whether to be amused or disgusted by the fact that gambling has become as important to the Lake Charles economy as oil refining, but it's clear that getting the riverboat casinos back on line was a local priority.

I reached Lafayette about an hour before kickoff and made my way down Ambassador Caffery Parkway to Cajun Field. Lafayette itself didn't seem to be any worse for wear after Hurricane Rita, but like other cities (e.g. Houston and Baton Rouge) its population has been swollen by the Katrina diaspora. Something like 1,400 evacuees from New Orleans still living at the Cajundome; they all wore tags that had their pictures on them and read "CAJUNDOME RESIDENT." Many of them attended the game - they got in free of charge - and naturally cheered for Tulane.

There were probably about 500 UH fans at Cajun Field, including a good portion of the UH band, which I thought was a decent turnout considering that this game's status was unsettled as recently as three weeks ago and there were virtually no hotel vacancies in Lafayette. Tulane probably brought about 1,500 people (it was technically a home game for them), and ULL students, evacuees, national guard members, relief workers and others made the rest of the crowd of about four or five thousand people. I don't know where the 15k attendance figure in the boxscore comes from - perhaps tickets Tulane sold to this game before the hurricane?

The first half was probably the worst half of football I have witnessed in a long time. Neither the Cougars nor the Green Wave were particularly impressive on offense, and the score was 7-7 at the half.  However, the Cougars made adjustments at halftime and scored 21 points in the third quarter by keeping the ball on the ground and wearing away the Green Wave defense. Tulane simply could not stop Cougar running backs Jackie Battle and Ryan Gilbert. The Houston defense stepped up as well, forcing a turnover and allowing the Green Wave to reach the endzone only once more, during garbage time late in the fourth quarter. As an added bonus, the Cougars made no special teams mistakes and had no turnovers. Dare I say that improvement is being made?

My friend Amy also happened to be in Lafayette that weekend, visiting her family, and she and her son came out to the stadium to meet me and watch part of the game with me. She even brought me a link of boudin from Comeaux's Grocery. Cajun hospitality! Otherwise, I spent the game sitting with fellow UH fans watching the Coogs notch their second consecutive victory on the road.

After the game, it was time to return home. It was evident from the interstate that there are still several neighborhoods in Lake Charles, Orange and Beaumont that still do not have electricity. Roadside services are available along I-10, even in the area hit by Rita - I got gas at a station in Sulphur, outside of Lake Charles - but from the interstate it's hard to tell if gas stations or restaurants are open at night because all of the high mast signs have been blown out.

I returned to Houston around midnight. It had been a long trip, and seeing firsthand the physical destruction of Rita and the social upheaval of Katrina was a very sobering experience. But the watching a critical UH victory over a divisional rival definitely made the trip worthwhile.

Next up for the Coogs is Memphis. This Saturday's game will be their first home game in a month, since September 24th's home game against Southern Miss had to be rescheduled due to Rita. 

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015.)

Astros knock off the Braves for the second year in a row

Last weekend was a good weekend for Houston sports teams. Well, except for the Texans, and let’s face it, who really cares about them?

The Astros outlasted the Atlanta Braves in an amazing and historic National League Divisional Series Game Four and made it to the National League Championship Series for the second year in a row, where they will once again meet up with the St. Louis Cardinals. The eighteen-inning marathon set a new record for the longest postseason game ever played. The previous record, the sixteen-inning Game Six of the 1986 NLCS, also featured the Astros. 

Although the Astros were not technically facing elimination in Sunday’s game, I really didn’t like their chances in a possible Game Five, since they would have had to travel back to Atlanta and face Braves hurler John Smoltz, who has historically owned the Astros in the postseason. For much of the game, however, it looked like a return trip to Atlanta was indeed on the agenda, as the Astros trailed 6-1 going into the eighth inning. However, a grand slam by Lance Berkman in the bottom of the eighth, followed by a just-barely home run by Brad Ausmus with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, tied things up. The tie would remain for the next nine innings of what essentially became a doubleheader. The extra frames were excruciating to watch, as neither the Braves nor the Astros could put any more runs on the board, and by the sixteenth inning the Astros had run out of bullpen relievers and had to resort to Roger Clemens, who made only his second relief appearance in his long career.

I remember all too well the aforementioned Game Six of the 1986 NLCS. I remember Kevin Bass striking out in the bottom of the sixteenth inning. I remember the New York Mets, who would go on to win the World Series that year, celebrating their 7-6 victory on the Astrodome turf. And I remember crying my eyes out. A lot of people believe that Game Six of the 1986 NLCS is the greatest game ever played. One guy even wrote a book about it. For me, it’s just another painful memory as a Houston sports fan, much like Jimmy Valvano’s wild celebration after his North Carolina State team upset the Houston Cougars on a last-second dunk in the 1983 NCAA basketball championship game, or the Houston Oilers’ spectacular 32-point choke to the Buffalo Bills in the 1993 AFC Wild Card game. And as I watched the agonizing extra innings last Sunday, I kept having flashbacks to that NLCS moment, nineteen years ago. Would this be yet another in a long line of bitter, painful Houston sports memories?

Fortunately, Chris Burke assured that it would not. Instead, his magnificent game-winning home run in the bottom of the eighteenth instantly became one in a (much shorter) list of Houston sports highlights. 

As a Houston sports fan, I am accustomed to watching the local teams fail. So when a local team succeeds, especially as amazingly and improbably as the Astros did last Sunday, it's always a pleasant surprise.

So now it’s on to the Cardinals. Will this be the year that the Astros finally make it into the World Series? Probably not; the Cardinals are just as good as they were last year and the Astros don’t have Carlos Beltran or Jeff Kent in the lineup this year. But after Sunday's game, as well as the remarkable fact that the Astros made the playoffs after being fifteen games below .500 at one point this season, I'm really not complaining. The Astros beat the cursed Braves two years in a row, and that's always something to celebrate.

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015.)

Wrapping up Rita

Lori made it home safely late last night. She was exhausted, physically as well as emotionally drained from her week-long absence, but glad to be home nevertheless. She left Kirby in Temple with my mother and my aunt; mom will probably bring him home sometime today.

Things in Houston are quickly returning to normal. Gas stations are being resupplied, grocery stores are busy restocking shelves, businesses are reopening and streets and highways that were eerily deserted last Friday and Saturday are once again full of cars.

An article in Monday's Chronicle regarding the evacuation process reflects my feelings about the ordeal. As the subtitle says, "The evacuation shows more need to stay put, and all lanes should be outbound."

Hurricane planners have a little ditty that goes, "run from the water, hide from the wind."

It means evacuate if you are in a coastal surge area, but hunker down if you are in an area that will get hurricane-force winds and rain only.

The biggest problem in Houston's painful evacuation last week was that perhaps a million people, almost half of those who left, ran from the wind. To make matters worse, the regional evacuation plan was missing a key element — pre-planned contraflow lanes that are a part of virtually every other hurricane-prone city's evacuation strategy.

As I've said, a lot of people got caught up in a (mostly-media-driven) frenzy and left when they probably would have done just as well to stay where they were, and that exacerbated the evacuation chaos. It also absolutely amazes me that, before last Thursday, there was no contraflow evacuation plan in place - it was all done ad-hoc as the interstates leading out of town became hopelessly clogged with people.

Hurricane Rita is a learning experience for everybody: residents, local planning and law enforcement officials, elected officials, and, hopefully, the local media.

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015.)

Rita: did we overreact?

I finally went to sleep around 7 am yesterday morning, once the winds had begun to die down and the radar showed that the storm was on its way out. Later in the afternoon I went to my folks' house and helped my dad cut and clear fallen limbs from the front yard (it's the same sickly ash tree that lost most of its limbs during Alicia 22 years ago; it probably just needs to be removed altogether and replaced with a stronger species). Damage to this neighborhood has been confined to tree limbs and branches. The streets were a mess, littered with leaves and branches, but that was the extent of destruction - no roof damage or broken windows, from what I could see. Thankfully and amazingly, we never lost power or cable/internet service here (Danny and I were even chatting with my brother in Japan over the computer early Saturday morning, as the winds howled outside), although other parts of this neighborhood did; my parents' house was without electricity until late this afternoon so my dad spent last night here.

Saturday evening Danny and I actually found a gas station nearby whose tanks had just been reloaded and we used the opportunity to fill up the car. Then we went to the Dog House Tavern (one of the few businesses open last night) to celebrate the passing of the storm.

The Houston area dodged a bullet at this time. A direct hit, from a much stronger hurricane, would have been absolutely devastating. As recently as Wednesday, that very scenario was one being predicted by the weather forecasters.

That sent millions of people fleeing the region, which in turn created gridlock on highways leading out of town. Four-hour trips to Dallas and San Antonio turned into grueling sixteen-hour journeys as the highways became hopelessly clogged with vehicles. Untold numbers of people ran out of gas and became stranded along the shoulders, desperately looking for assistance. In a freak accident, 23 elderly people being evacuated from a Bellaire nursing home were killed when their bus literally exploded outside of Dallas. There were other reports of death from heat exhaustion was well, as motorists, in an attempt to conserve gasoline, turned off air conditioners and put themselves at the mercy of 100-degree temperatures.

In the coming weeks, there is going to be a great deal of discussion and finger-pointing regarding this evacuation process. Was the area's evacuation plan adequate? Did people, with the destruction wrought by Katrina fresh in their minds, overreact to the approaching storm?

The answers, in my opinion, are "probably not" and "probably." The network of evacuation routes, the contraflow implementation plan, and the prioritization of evacuation zones will probably all need to be revisited and refined, but there's only so much that can be done when upwards of three million people are all trying to get out at once. The second question is one that has been discussed by other bloggers (see Beldar and Kuff, for example), and while I really don't think you can "overreact" to the prospect of a category five hurricane bearing down on your city, I do believe that a lot of people - folks out on the northern and western fringes of town, not in floodplains or designated evacuation zones, for example - got caught up in a collective hysteria and decided to leave when when it wasn't yet necessary for them to do so, thereby adding to the overall gridlock. There were reports of people in mandatory evacuation zones such as Clear Lake City or even Galveston giving up and returning to their homes due to the standstill conditions on area freeways, and that is something that is truly unacceptable.

I believe it would have helped if the overall reaction to the storm were a bit more measured and rational in the days before it hit. I think the local news media deserves most of the blame in this regard; they hyped this thing for all it was worth and, in my opinion, needlessly panicked a lot of people. Hurricane predictions 72 hours before landfall are notoriously inaccurate, meaning that the storm more than likely was going to spare Houston a direct hit. This, indeed, is what happened to Rita: it veered off to the east and only brushed Houston. Secondly, there was almost-universal agreement among weather professionals that the storm, which was indeed a category five as it churned over the warm sea earlier in the week, would weaken as it moved into cooler waters closer inland and would not be as intense once it made landfall. This, again, is what happened to Rita, as it weakened from a category 5 out in the Gulf to a category 3 when it made landfall. I wish that these facts, as well as the locations and the designs of the evacuation zones themselves, had been more prominently explained by the local media (as well as elected officials), as it no doubt would have caused a lot of people who were not in areas of high risk, such as Katy or Cypress or Tomball, to assess the situation a bit more objectively before they decided to jam the highways leading out of town. That, in turn, would have helped to allow the people that were in truly high-risk areas to get out first.

But instead of rational, calm discussion of the hurricane, the uncertainties inherent in its projected path, the effects of wind on areas several dozen miles inland, and the like, what we got were a bunch of blow-dried local television anchors and weather-guessers orgasmically screaming about a monster category five hurricane heading our way and bringing with it certain death and destruction to the city of Houston. The media also focused on the evacuation story, which in my opinion created a very clear implication of "everybody else is getting out why they still can, and you should be getting out, too."

With that said, I want to make it clear that I do not fault anybody for their decision to leave, regardless of their location. The local media breathlessly kept repeating that Houston was faced with the prospect of a direct hit from the third-strongest Gulf hurricane on record, and people did what they obviously thought was best at the time, which was to get out of the path of the destructive storm. As I've said in a previous post, the fact that trees were being toppled and power outages were occurring here in Houston from a storm whose center was one hundred miles to the east - making landfall in another state - proves just how massive, powerful and deadly these things are, and people took this storm seriously. My own family members were among those who fled; Lori decided to take Kirby and relocate to Dallas Wednesday morning, and my mother took off to Temple later that day. Both of them, fortunately, got out before the bulk of the traffic built up.

So perhaps the people who got out didn't overreact; the media, however, clearly did. Objective information regarding the storm, and the evacuation process, should had been clearer earlier on, so people who were not in high-risk areas could have made a more informed decision before they decided to flee.
There's also the risk that the media-driven hype over Rita will desensitize people, especially those living in high-risk areas, to the threats raised by future storms. These folks will remember the chaotic evacuation process, and the much-ado-about-nothing shrillness heaped upon Rita, and make the risky decision to ride the next storm out. Houston might not be so lucky next time.

There's a flip side to this as well: just as the people who evacuated the region do not deserved to be criticized, the people who decided to stay, such as myself, do not deserved to be criticized either. I've seen comments on various local forums that the people who stayed behind were "lucky rather than smart" - the clear implication being that those who decided to hunker down and ride it out were somehow stupid - and I've even received criticism from family members for deciding to stay. I find these insinuations and criticism unfair and even insulting.

I sheltered in place at my house, which is a good fifty miles inland, it is not located in a floodplain, and it is not in a designated evacuation zone. My own plan, as I have said, was to move up to the in-laws' house in the northwestern portion of the county, using local roads, if the hurricane remained a category four or five and continued its track towards Galveston or Freeport. That would have put another thirty miles between myself and the coast. However, as Rita's projected area of landfall veered off to the east, I decided to remain here. In retrospect, it was the correct decision for me.

Obviously, I'm not saying I'll make the same decision next time. Each storm is different, and the "stay or go" decision will be made on a case-by-case basis given the information available regarding the storm's path and strength. But my neighborhood is not in a high-risk area, and I don't think I need to add to the horrific traffic jams by reflexively evacuating from a hurricane whose landfall, which has a margin of error of hundreds of miles, is three days away.

I guess my point is this: if you decided to evacuate, you did so based on the information you had available at the time (although I believe some of that information was needlessly exaggerated) and you did what you thought was in your best interests. Likewise, if you decided to stay (provided you were not in a coastal evacuation zone or other are of obvious risk), you also did so based on what you thought was in your best interests. Nobody deserves to be criticized for their decision to stay or go. Fortunately, things worked out for the best for Houston (not so much for Lake Charles, Beaumont or Port Arthur, obviously, and I wish those communities a speedy recovery). All we can do is learn from this and move on, because hurricanes are a fact of life along the Gulf Coast and there will certainly be a "next time."

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015. With the tenth anniversary of Rita only a month away, it's worth noting that, in terms of human suffering, the evacuation was catastrophic. 107 people perished during the exodus: that's more than were killed by Hurricane Carla, Hurricane Alicia, Tropical Storm Alison and Hurricane Ike - combined.)

Rita Update II

It's now 2 am, and amazingly enough I still have electricity. I expect to lose it at any moment, however, as the wind continues to pick up. Otherwise, things are going as well as can be expected. No structural damage or falling tree limbs yet, and the rain hasn't even been too heavy thus far.

The rain and gusting winds we're experiencing here are being generated by a system whose center is well over 100 miles to the east of here. It really makes you understand just how massive and just how powerful hurricanes are. They are awesome in every sense of the word.

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015.)

Rita Update

It's about 8 pm, and the outermost rainbands of the hurricane are now reaching my neighborhood. The rainfall is really very mild at this point and the winds are still rather gentle. This will not remain the case for long, however; heavier rainbands are quickly approaching and I expect the really nasty stuff to start hitting in another two or three hours.

Yesterday Rita's projected area of landfall moved to the other side of Houston and it now appears that it's going to hit Port Authur. That puts Houston on the so-called "dry" side of the hurricane. This is not to diminish the weather we're going to get here - hurricanes are dangerous no matter what side of them you're on - but being to the west of a hurricane is better than taking a direct hit or being just to its east.

Danny and I are staying where we are. I think we'll be okay, although I'm worried about the tree in front of the house.

I'll try to provide another update in a few hours if I still have electricity. 

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015.)

Rita approaches

Lori took herself and the kid to Dallas, but I've decided to ride the storm out here at the house as long as the predicted landfall location remains south of Freeport. My brother-in-law Danny will be here with me.

I expect there to be some wind damage here, especially to trees, and there might even be some street flooding like this neighborhood experienced during Alison, but at this point in time I feel that I am far enough inland and the storm's projected path is far enough to the south that I do not expect major structural failure to occur.

If the situation changes (i.e. the projected storm track moves significantly northward) then Danny and I will probably relocate to to his and Lori's parents' house on the northwest side of town.

I will try to post updates, although I expect to lose electricity at some point. Wish me luck.

(Retroblogged August 23, 2015.)

Coogs get their first win of 2025

Last Saturday, the Coogs notched their first win of the season by defeating the Sam Houston State Bearkats 31-10 at Robertson Stadium. Some might say that a win over a I-AA school is meaningless, but I’d have to disagree in this instance because, let’s face it, wins of any kind have been hard to come by for the Coogs lately. Besides, Sam is a pretty good I-AA squad, having gone all the way to the I-AA semifinals last season (a football playoff! What a concept!), and they always give the Coogs a good game. So I’ll gladly take it.

Play was sloppy at times, and the Coogs still have some problem areas that must be addressed: penalties, special teams miscues (several kickoffs went out of bounds) and turnovers. A better pass rush is a must, too. It will be a long season if these concerns aren’t remedied in a hurry.

Houston has a short week to prepare for their next opponent, the Texas-El Paso Miners. Friday night's nationally-televised game at the Sun Bowl is going to be tough, and it will be a good barometer of how good (or bad) the Coogs actually are.

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015. The week before, the Cougars lost their season opener to Oregon at Reliant Stadium, 24-38, in a game that was overshadowed by the Katrina evacuees from New Orleans being bused in to the Astrodome next door.)

Astroworld calls it quits.

At the end of the 2005 season in October, Six Flags is going to shut the 37-year-old theme park down and sell the property on which it sits. Six Flags claims that rising land values in the area have made the property worth more than the park itself, which has suffered from declining attendance, and that parking disputes with the folks at Reliant are also to blame. For whatever reason, a Houston landmark is disappearing.

I can’t say I’m surprised. The park has been on the downhill for a long time. It was aging and poorly-maintained, and was unable to expand beyond its 109-acre footprint. Attendance declined as the park suffered from a proliferation of new Six Flags properties in places like San Antonio, Louisiana and Mexico (whose thrill-seeking population no longer had to travel to Houston to get their roller-coaster fix) as well as a reputation as a gang-banger hangout. The exorbitant admission price (currently $42 for an adult) also kept increasing numbers of people away.

I have mixed feelings about AstroWorld’s demise. When I was a kid, I spent many a summer day there, riding the Greezed Lightnin’ and the XLR-8. When I was in college, I spent the summers of 1992 and 1994 working there, being treated like crap for minimum wage. (Somewhere in the Bush family photo album is a picture, taken during the 1992 Republican National Convention, of Bugs Bunny posing with a bunch of George and Barbara’s grandchildren and well as a few secret service agents. The guy in the Bugs Bunny costume would be me.) I hadn't set foot in the theme park for a long time, and really have had no desire to do so (my tolerance of long lines, brutal heat and overpriced food has waned somewhat since I was a kid), although I always envisioned that one day I’d be taking Kirby there. It looks like that’s not going to happen.

The site on which the property stands is has excellent access to transportation, since it is bounded by Kirby, Loop 610 and the light rail line. It is in a good location, near the Reliant complex and the Texas Medical Center. Given the fact that over 100 contiguous acres of property are hard to come by in this area, I’d have to say that this property probably won’t be on the market for long. Hopefully some sort of well-designed mixed-use development will appear there, with retail along the 610 frontage and a transit-oriented component adjacent to the light rail station.

AstroWorld was originally developed by Harris County Judge Roy Hofheinz as part of the so-called "Astrodomain" that included the Astrodome and Astroarena. It opened in 1968, three years after the Astrodome, and was purchased by Six Flags in 1975. The park’s signature ride, the Texas Cyclone, opened a year later. I think I’ll miss the Cyclone most of all.

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015. I wrote an article very similar to this in 2008. The anticipated redevelopment of the park's site has never occurred and, with the exception of its use as overflow parking during the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo, the land still sits vacant. But I still don't miss that place.)

More on the future of New Orleans

Joel Garreau, author of Edge City and The Nine Nations of North America, wrote an article in Sunday's Washington Post exploring the future - or lack thereof - of The Big Easy. It is interesting to compare his take on the city's future with George Friedman's Stratfor article that I referenced last week. Friedman argues that, since a port at the mouth of the Mississippi River is critically important to the nation's economy, and ports need cities to support them, New Orleans will be rebuilt. Garreau agrees with the need for the port but is not convinced of the need for a city, because modern port operations are extremely automated and do not employ enough people to support a large city. Garreau argues that “a thriving port is not the same thing as a thriving city” and that New Orleans, with its high office vacancy rates, tourist-reliant economy, and crippling poverty, was anything but thriving. “The city of New Orleans has for years resembled Venice -- a beloved tourist attraction but not a driver of global trade,” he writes. Garreau looks back at Babylon, Carthage and Pompeii to remind us that “cities are not forever:”
 

What the city of New Orleans is really up against, however, is the set of economic, historic, social, technological and geological forces that have shaped fixed settlements for 8,000 years. Its necessity is no longer obvious to many stakeholders with the money to rebuild it, from the oil industry, to the grain industry, to the commercial real estate industry, to the global insurance industry, to the politicians.

 

Garreau is among those (such as myself) who suggest that New Orleans, with its population scattered across the nation – “the biggest resettlement in American history,” according to Rice professor Stephen Kleinberg in this Christian Science Monitor article – might end up much like Galveston did after the 1900 hurricane. “Galveston today is a charming tourist and entertainment destination, but it never returned to its old commercial glory,” he writes. “In part, that’s because the leaders of Houston took one look at what the at what the hurricane had wrought and concluded a barrier island might not be the best place to build the major metropolis that a growing east central Texas was going to need.”

This sentiment is echoed by an article in Tuesday’s USA Today regarding the instant boomtown of Baton Rouge, which is currently Louisiana’s largest city as well as its commercial center. The city is in the process of absorbing 200,000 new residents and at least two thousand businesses from New Orleans. Displaced companies are setting up shop in whatever space they can find, even abandoned grocery stores, and rental rates are skyrocketing. Homes are selling, oftentimes sight unseen, for $500,000 in cash. The city is choked with traffic. Schools are overcrowded. Hotels are all booked. Airlines are adding flights from Chicago, St. Louis and Newark. 

 

While Baton Rouge residents worry the boom may be temporary until New Orleans is rebuilt, the aftermath of another deadly hurricane may point to a different outcome.

A devastating 1900 hurricane in Galveston, Texas, forced a massive exodus of people and businesses to what was then a small community: Houston. Now, Baton Rouge is competing head-to-head with Houston, the fourth-largest city, with a population of 2 million, for businesses that are thinking twice about returning to New Orleans.

Hurricane Katrina will be remembered for a lot of things, from its unspeakable devastation to its horrific human toll to its virtual destruction of a major American city to the miserably bungled federal, state and local response in its wake. But it will also be remembered for the profound demographic, economic and social changes it created – not just along the Gulf Coast but nationwide – as it scattered hundreds of thousands of displaced people across the country in a matter of weeks and permanently altered the urban hierarchy of the region, as cities like Baton Rouge, Jackson, Shreveport and Houston absorbed the people and businesses of New Orleans.The true effects of Katrina can only be accurately evaluated in retrospect, but its hard not to believe that this disaster will go down as one of the most monumental and pivotal events in US history. 

(Retroblogged on August 23, 2015. Ten years later, how accurate was this? It turns out that the hurricane's effect on Baton Rouge was short-lived; Katrina evacuees eventually returned to New Orleans and Baton Rouge's 2010 population was not significantly larger than its 2000 population. Those flights to places like Chicago, Newark and Denver were canceled a few years after they were started.)