Source of book image: http://images.indiebound.com/636/044/9780807044636.jpg
(p. C8) As Mr. Wooten recounts, obstacles abounded from a municipality bent on redesigning New Orleans while the city was still in crisis. Neighborhoods from middle-class Lakeview to the devastated Lower Ninth Ward began to fear that the city they loved didn’t love them back.
“Planning is crap,” said Martin Landrieu, a member of a prominent local political family, at a meeting of Lakeview residents. “What you really need is the cleaning up of houses . . . . Where are the hammers and nails?” Yet five months after Katrina, a city commission called Bring New Orleans Back presented an ambitious plan to restore the city that included converting neighborhoods that had heavy flooding into green space. The commission also imposed a temporary moratorium on rebuilding there. Residents would have to show that their communities were viable or risk being planned out of existence; they were given four months.
For the full review, see:
CARLA MAIN. “After the Waters Receded.” The Wall Street Journal (Sat., August 4, 2012): C8.
(Note: ellipsis in original.)
(Note: the online version of the article was dated August 3, 2012.)