Cypress Triangle

I went to see the Cypress Triangle yesterday, escorted by a very esteemed elder. The Triangle is where the marsh directly to the north of the Ninth Ward begins. I saw stumps where many cypress trees had once been. The cause for this graveyard was not Katrina but the salt water intrusion into the marsh over the past several decades. The arrival of saltier waters into the wetlands is due to rising of the sea level and the simultaneous sinking of Louisiana into the ocean. The cypress trees, had they been viable could have slowed down Katrina's winds and storm surges, but there were no leaves to catch the energy, just stumps left. Katrina would breach the levees about a mile down the Industrial Canal into the Ninth Ward, flood the entire neighborhood, and bring a barge from the Canal smashing down on houses and dreams.

The salt water intrusion is happening in all of the wetlands wherever land is sinking relative to the ocean. It so happens that in those wetlands hit hardest by intrusion, pollution, are adjacent to economically depressed communitites. This in fact is a case of Environmental Justice.

My escort, a resident and activist, showed me the place where city, state officials want to put a trolley station and renovate the area. The location is at the end of Caffin Street, directly in the heart of the Lower Ninth Ward. Real estate prices would subsequently rise and in order for developers to make money, they want those displaced homeowners to not come back. Build up a richer, cosier environment for people who can afford it-just a train ride from the French Quarter. And replant the Cypress Triangle with live trees. Finally.

So how do activists work in solidarity with residents to rebuild a devastated community, better than it was, as cozy and lush as the in plans of the developers, move the salt-water out of the marshes and bring in secondarily-treated wastewater to feed the trees nutrients?

As far as rebuilding, restoring the Lower Ninth, some want to proliferate solar panels, advocate turning off the TV. Others advocate DIY projects that use waste, are cheap and easy to maintain. Not only are they "off the grid" but they promote self-reliance and self-confidence and autonomy. That in a crisis people can and should rely on each other, and not look to the government.