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NEW ORLEANS EDITION
SATURDAY, APRIL 21, 2007
171st year No. 90
A study finds that New Orleans has plenty of
real estate above sea level that is being underutilized
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Source: Map provided by Richard Campanella
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By Leslie Williams
Staff writer
A yearlong topographic and
demographic study of New Orleans arrives this month like the
latest installment of the television
series “MythBusters” — and
may forever change the notion of
the Big Easy as a below-sea-level
city.
“Contrary to popular perceptions, half of New Orleans is at or
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See GOVERNOR, A-12
In alliance with
The Times-Picayune
RE
Now that Gov.
Kathleen Blanco, former U.S.
Sen. John Breaux and Lt. Gov.
Mitch Landrieu have declined to
run for governor this fall, the
Democratic Party is struggling
to find a big-name candidate to
take on Republican Rep. Bobby
Jindal and his high-octane campaign for the office.
Some party leaders have gone
so far as to approach state Sen.
Walter Boasso, a mostly self-financed Republican candidate
BATON ROUGE —
Classified
Comics
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STAFF GRAPHIC
above sea level,” according to the
study by Tulane and Xavier universities’ Center for Bioenvironmental Research.
Yep, half.
And if you want to cling to
other myths, such as Monkey Hill
at Audubon Zoo being the highest spot in New Orleans, avoid
the study’s author, a celebrated
research professor who years ago
went house-hunting in Bywater
with his wife, Marina, toting topographic maps.
“No, Monkey Hill is not the
highest,” said Richard Campanella, leaning over to review elevation data captured by LIDAR,
a precise light imaging detection
technology, to support his point.
“It’s 25.4 feet high; a hill in the
Couturie Forest in City Park is
27.5 feet.”
In the study, data captured
with LIDAR from 1999 through
2001 were used to identify the
heavily populated areas in the
New Orleans area that are at and
above sea level, replacing impressions with facts. In calculating
the proportion of the city above
sea level, sparsely inhabited areas such as Bayou Sauvage were
not accounted for.
“Innumerable media reports
following Hurricane Katrina described the topography of New
Orleans as unconditionally below
sea level,” the study notes. “This
oversimplification is inaccurate
by half, and its frequent repetition does a great disservice to the
city.”
See GEOGRAPHY, A-14
AT-AND-ABOVE LIST Greater Carrollton | River Bend | Audubon/University | Uptown | Garden District | Lower Garden District
Irish Channel | French Quarter | Treme | Bayou St. John | Marigny | Bywater | Holy Cross | Algiers Point | McDonogh | Lakeshore
Lake Vista | Lake Terrace | Lake Oaks | Warehouse District | AND MORE | MAP OF OPEN OR UNDERUTILIZED HIGH GROUND, A-14
Capital bureau
READ THE LATEST
NEWS ONLINE
ES
510
S AVE.
ELMWOOD
Critics blast expense,
size of LSU proposal
By Ed Anderson
and Robert Travis Scott
‘Right now I’ve
got an open
mind,’ lawmaker
says of switch
PARK AVE.
CITY
LAN
EUR
MENT
CHEF
Plan for new hospital
calling for $1.2 billion
Demos hunt
for big-name
candidate
Sen. Walter
Boasso
610
10
EASTERN NEW ORLEANS
GENTILLY
City
Park
NAPOLEON
See LEE, A-13
90
LAKEVIEW
TU
JEFFERSON
M
East Jefferson bureau
Industrial
Canal
LAKEFRONT
AIRLINE DR.
ST
By Michelle Hunter
Surrounded by crawfish and constituents, Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee on Friday vowed
to win re-election in September even as he revealed that he is battling an acute form of
leukemia, a more aggressive type of the cancer
that appears with little or no warning and progresses rapidly.
“If I’ve got to limp to the qualifying line or
they got to put me in a wheelchair or if they got to
get me there in a stretcher, I’m qualifying,” Lee
said Friday night from a campaign kickoff crawfish boil at the Avondale Truck Stop, which he coowns. Qualifying begins on Sept. 4.
Although Lee, 74, went public with his
leukemia diagnosis Tuesday, he initially said he
did not remember what specific type of the bone
marrow and blood disorder he has. Chronic forms
of leukemia move slowly and can be treated with
blood transfusions. But acute leukemias typically
require aggressive chemotherapy, according to
Dr. John Cole, head of hematology and oncology
at the Ochsner Cancer Institute.
Lee said he has an appointment Tuesday
morning at Stanford University’s Comprehensive
Cancer Center in Palo Alto, Calif., where he’ll get
a second opinion. The doctors in California and
Louisiana will consult and decide what treatment
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SOMETHING TO CONSIDER:
Lake Pontchartrain
is one foot above
sea level
Below sea level
ELYSIAN FIELD
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Lake Pontchartrain
METAIRIE
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He vows to be re-elected sheriff
despite illness, looming treatment
KENNER
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At or above sea level
A yearlong study by Tulane and Xavier universities' Center for
Bioenvironmental Research concludes half of the city in the
study area is at or above sea level. It recommends this
“valuable natural resource should be prioritized for human
habitation” whenever practical. And it has identified throughout
New Orleans open and underutilized parcels above sea level.
CLEAR
Lee says
he has
acute form
of leukemia
.. .
HIGHER GROUND
BEHRMAN HWY.
STAFF PHOTO BY JOHN McCUSKER
Jefferson Parish Sheriff Harry Lee, 74, talks to
supporters Friday during a campaign kickoff at
Avondale Truck Stop. Despite having leukemia,
Lee said he plans to run for another term.
By Jan Moller
Capital bureau
BATON ROUGE — The future
New Orleans health-care market will be able to accommodate a 484-bed Louisiana
State University teaching hospital that would cost more
than $1.2 billion to build, according to a long-awaited
business plan that drew immediate fire from critics who
say the state needs to move
away from the charity system
model.
The size and cost of the pro-
Editorials
Living
Money
B-6
C
C-12
posed hospital, which would
serve as the main teaching
hub for LSU and Tulane University medical students and
post-graduate residents, far
exceed any previous estimates.
The authors of the business
plan said the size of the hospital is critical to its financial
success, as it needs to be big
enough to draw the privatepay and Medicare patients
who are critical to a healthy
bottom line. If the state builds
a smaller hospital, as some
have proposed, the beds
would be filled with indigent
patients and the hospital
would have trouble generating
enough cash to pay off its construction bonds, according to
the plan.
National
People
Religion
A-8
A-18
C-8
But critics said the size and
cost will continue the charity
model, which they view as a
dinosaur in the current
health-care market, and they
said the state should instead
focus its energy on redirecting
safety-net dollars away from
the LSU system into insurance vouchers that the poor
can use to seek care in the private sector.
U.S. Sen. David Vitter, RLa., said: “Never in my wildest fears would I have predicted this — no commitment
to redesign yet and a proposed very big charity that
costs 12 times more than any
previous estimate. Unbelievable. ”
Sports
D
Washington A-4
World
A-16
Schools chief
not certain if
she will leave
By Steve Ritea
Staff writer
Two-and-a-half months after
the Recovery School District superintendent said she was considering resigning because of a
lack of public support and strain
on her family, Robin Jarvis said
Friday she is job hunting, but
has not made a “final decision”
about whether to stay or go.
Jarvis acknowledged she has
met with other prospective employers, including the Center
for Child Development at the
University of Louisiana at La-
Robin Jarvis
Superintendent
talked of
burnout in
February
See SCHOOLS, A-9
See HOSPITAL, A-12
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