Cedar rapids-New Orleans contrast

I have lived where it never snows (Los Angeles), and where it snows every year, sometimes real bad (Jersey).

My observation has been that people who have to deal with getting snowed in, plowed in (and over), and getting to and from work in 36 inches of snow generally are pretty tough and just deal with it (as well as life in general). Meanwhile, those folks who hardly ever have anything to worry about, start griping and moaning at the first sign of rain (or other minor problem/non-issue).
 
Well its not the chocolate city.
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Another nice thing about living here in Eastern Iowa:
People don't judge each other for their skin color, sexual orientation, religion, political outlook, or religion.
Around here you are what you do when it matters.
 
Yeah, it is great that people in the midwest don't whine as much as the folks in NOLA about being flooded out. However, the one way in which both groups are exactly the same is that both vow to rebuild in place. The NOLA folks rebuild below sea level and the Iowans keep rebuilding on a flood plain that has flooded multiple times in the last 30 years.

The really amazing thing is that both groups seem surprised and "devastated" every time they get flooded out. Why is that? It isn't like it hasn't happened before and it isn't like they didn't know it would happen again. People are often like ants in this regard certainly no brighter.

So we have two groups that stupidly keep rebuilding in locations where they can expect to be flooded out time and time again and so the only really difference is who complains the most? Big deal.
 
People are often like ants in this regard certainly no brighter.
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Interesting, DoubleNaught, that your only comments during their crisis is to compare them to stupid ants. I think your comments tell us all more about you than about those you criticize.

Seems like ants, as well as some people just aren't quitters. Right, DoubleNaught?:rolleyes:

As many times as they've been flooded out, they've rebuilt and resumed producing a large portion of the food we eat on our country's most productive farm land-- while managing to raise their kids to be the same good Americans they are.
 
The NOLA folks rebuild below sea level and the Iowans keep rebuilding on a flood plain that has flooded multiple times in the last 30 years.
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Actually, this is something we agree on. The areas inside the 100 year floodplain should not be rebuilt IMO.
 
Just to play devil's advocate what value does the land known as NO have other then to build houses on? In contrast what does the land being flooded in Iowa have? In the case of Iowa it is farmland which means a crop and therefore money. Where ever there is a chance at money there will always be those put forth hard work and make an attempt to earn a share of it. In doing so they assume the risk. In Iowa (unlike NO) when the risk does become reality they deal with it, rebuild and move on hoping for better years to come. NO on the other hand simply waits for a hand out then whines and crys discrimination when it does not come. There was just a write up on the news about how some of the refugees from NO are claiming discrimation becuase they are being kicked out of free housing, After 3 years rent free no less.....

But when it's all said and done what this realy comes down to is two cultures, one urban and the other rural, and which is better at dealing with natural disaster on a large scale.

And one more thing, As for building in a area prone to diasater. Almost every region of the country is prone to natural disaters of some type. Twisters in Texas, Oklahoma, Lanslides on the west coast. Hurricanes in the south east. etc., etc.,
 
Concerning New Orleans: Booker T Washington talked about this attitude problem a hundred years ago and was resoundingly shouted down by WEB Du Bois and the NAACP. He warned about what would happen if people, both black and white, retained the slave mentality attitude which said that work was undignified and to be avoided. Time and again history has proven him right. (Even Du Bois later retracted his criticism though by then it was too late.)

Iowans on the other hand have the attitude of free citizens. They don't see anything demeaning about shoveling to fill up sandbags, scraping mud, cleaning, washing and digging.

We're always quick to say that free citizens own guns and slaves don't but we seldom comment on the fact that free citizens seek work for their own betterment and slaves seek to avoid it.
 
Meek and Mild...

We're always quick to say that free citizens own guns and slaves don't but we seldom comment on the fact that free citizens seek work for their own betterment and slaves seek to avoid it.
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Absolutely excellent. Free people don't expect anyone to help them but themselves. I would much rather live in a rural community and have people that are actually neighbors than in a big city where everyone's a stranger.


Epyon
 
Actually, this is something we agree on. The areas inside the 100 year floodplain should not be rebuilt IMO.
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"100 year floodplain" is a great name. We had folks outside of Houston complaining of being flooded out. They had bought land and built a home on a 100 year floodplain that had flooded three years prior. The wife actually said in an interview that that she didn't see how it could happen because they still had 97 years left. Apparently, the folks outside Houston, folks along the Mississippi, etc. don't seem to get it that being in a floodplain is just that, a FLOODplain. I don't care if it is a 10, 100, or 500 year floodplain, it is a still a FLOODplain.

If you live on a floodplain, expect to get flooded. It is that simple. Consider yourself lucky for every day that you don't get flooded.

Have y'all noticed all the shots on TV of farmer's homes, often with a barn or two, surrounded by water but the home and immediate area around it is safe. Wonder why? Notice that many are older homes. Those are folks that know they are in a flood plain and smartly raised the land on to which to put a home. Sure their crops are lost, but that is how the flood plain works. It is what makes the land so fertile, getting renewed with sediments from flood events, but the farmers' homes are safe...because they took the proper precautions.
 
All of us are subsidizing a lot of really rich white people who chose to build houses up and down both coasts. The poor in New Orleans make easy targets, but they sure aren't the only ones hosing us.
 
I don't care if it is a 10, 100, or 500 year floodplain, it is a still a FLOODplain.
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Problem is that the 500 year floodplain is a guess rather than a concrete boundary and even that can be exceeded as we saw in this case.

IOW, it's hard to define what is or is not a floodplain.

Heck, I took basement damage and I live well outside even the 1000 year floodplain.
 
Actually, it isn't hard to define the floodplains. That is what geologists do. Many of the places flooding now have well documented histories of flooding back into the 1800s. As for other areas, information is available from the USGS. Anyone making a significant investment in land, buildings (such as homes) etc., should take the time to research their investment and know the risks. If you bought, buy, or live in a floodplain without flood insurance and without contingency plans, shame on you.

The irony here is that the floodplains predominately follow tributaries and major tributaries correspond with commerce historically. So you have towns built in the flood plains. The farmers benefit from the alluvial buildup and so they too like the floodplains and you get farm communities there.

The state is a little more than 56K square miles. The 1993 flood covered 23 million acres http://www.igsb.uiowa.edu/Browse/flood93/flood93.htm That translates into 35,900 square miles. Simply put, more than 60% of the state can flood as demo'd in 1993. ANYBODY in those areas that flooded in 1993 would have to realize that they are in a flood plain or should have known better.

Gotta love what the Iowa City planners did. They put the airport in the floodplain. It is much harder to airlift in supplies when your airport is under water.

As for your basement, ground water percolation isn't the same thing as surface flooding.
 
Actually, it isn't hard to define the floodplains. That is what geologists do. Many of the places flooding now have well documented histories of flooding back into the 1800s. As for other areas, information is available from the USGS.
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Unfortunately, the USGS survey data turned out to be somewhat inaccurate. We had areas that "should have flooded" that didn't and areas that "should not have flooded" that did.
Floodplains are computed from vertical height above the nearest riverbed, but don't take into account the dynamic factors in flooding.

That translates into 35,900 square miles. Simply put, more than 60% of the state can flood as demo'd in 1993. ANYBODY in those areas that flooded in 1993 would have to realize that they are in a flood plain or should have known better.
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Still doesn't solve the problem. The '93 flood crested here at a hair under 20'. So anyone who thought they were safe because '93 didn't get 'em was sadly mistaken when this year's crest went over 30'. So now is that level "safe"? Maybe 10 years down the road we get a crest of 40'? Maybe we go another thousand years and never see another flood this big?

How do you plan for that? At what height vertically do you set the line separating "floodplain" from the rest? 30'? 50'? 100'?
And are you suggesting that people should live within flood-prone areas with insurance, or should not live there? Do you suggest that people should live in NOLA with flood insurance or that every city in the United States should be rebuilt in the mountains?

As for your basement, ground water percolation isn't the same thing as surface flooding.
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It makes little difference exactly where the water came from if you're ripping up your carpet and drywall due to a flood. But in my case it wasn't "ground water percolation" (whatever the heck that is), but raw sewage. :barf:
 
GoSlash27, I would suggest that you contact a plumber and see if you can get a backflow preventer installed on your sewer lines. It is not unknown for blockages to push sewage back up the lines. Parents lived on side of a hill and sewer dept. foulup forced sewage to run across their floors, not slabongrade floors either.
 
LS,
I've already got one. It failed. Turns out that backflow preventers have a pressure limit that can be exceeded when the city's sewer grid is flooded out.

Which is why my basement carpet is now out on the curb. :o
Meh. Life goes on.
 
Why don't more people build on stilts up there? Down here many of the most vulnerable houses are on stilts, and some have an enclosed downstairs garage or room, but it's designed to blow out in a hurricane, leaving the stilts and the house above.

I have a little house on stilts, despite living in a place that is very unlikely to flood. The shaded concrete deck beneath is the coolest spot on the property on a hot day.
 
Why don't more people build on stilts up there? Down here many of the most vulnerable houses are on stilts, and some have an enclosed downstairs garage or room, but it's designed to blow out in a hurricane, leaving the stilts and the house above.

I have a little house on stilts, despite living in a place that is very unlikely to flood. The shaded concrete deck beneath is the coolest spot on the property on a hot day.
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I thought they called them things deer stands??
 
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