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America's Third Coast Series
Ain't There No More: Louisiana's Disappearing Coastal Plain
Winner of the 2018 Louisiana Literary Award given by the Louisiana Library Association
For centuries, outlanders have openly denigrated Louisiana's coastal wetlands residents and their stubborn refusal to abandon the region's fragile prairies tremblants despite repeated natural and, more recently, man-made disasters. Yet, the cumulative environmental knowledge these wetlands survivors have gained through painful experiences over the course of two centuries holds invaluable keys to the successful adaptation of modern coastal communities throughout the globe. As Hurricane Sandy recently demonstrated, coastal peoples everywhere face rising sea levels, disastrous coastal erosion, and, inevitably, difficult lifestyle choices.
Along the Bayou State's coast the most insidious challenges are man-made. Since channelization of the Mississippi River in the wake of the 1927 flood, which diverted sediments and nutrients from the wetlands, coastal Louisiana has lost to erosion, subsidence, and rising sea levels a land mass roughly twice the size of Connecticut. State and national policymakers were unable to reverse this environmental catastrophe until Hurricane Katrina focused a harsh spotlight on the human consequences of eight decades of neglect. Yet, even today, the welfare of Louisiana's coastal plain residents remains, at best, an afterthought in state and national policy discussions.
For coastal families, the Gulf water lapping at the doorstep makes this morass by no means a scholarly debate over abstract problems. Ain't There No More renders an easily read history filled with new insights and possibilities. Rare, previously unpublished images documenting a disappearing way of life accompany the narrative. The authors bring nearly a century of combined experience to distilling research and telling this story in a way invaluable to Louisianans, to policymakers, and to all those concerned with rising sea levels and seeking a long-term solution.
For centuries, outlanders have openly denigrated Louisiana's coastal wetlands residents and their stubborn refusal to abandon the region's fragile prairies tremblants despite repeated natural and, more recently, man-made disasters. Yet, the cumulative environmental knowledge these wetlands survivors have gained through painful experiences over the course of two centuries holds invaluable keys to the successful adaptation of modern coastal communities throughout the globe. As Hurricane Sandy recently demonstrated, coastal peoples everywhere face rising sea levels, disastrous coastal erosion, and, inevitably, difficult lifestyle choices.
Along the Bayou State's coast the most insidious challenges are man-made. Since channelization of the Mississippi River in the wake of the 1927 flood, which diverted sediments and nutrients from the wetlands, coastal Louisiana has lost to erosion, subsidence, and rising sea levels a land mass roughly twice the size of Connecticut. State and national policymakers were unable to reverse this environmental catastrophe until Hurricane Katrina focused a harsh spotlight on the human consequences of eight decades of neglect. Yet, even today, the welfare of Louisiana's coastal plain residents remains, at best, an afterthought in state and national policy discussions.
For coastal families, the Gulf water lapping at the doorstep makes this morass by no means a scholarly debate over abstract problems. Ain't There No More renders an easily read history filled with new insights and possibilities. Rare, previously unpublished images documenting a disappearing way of life accompany the narrative. The authors bring nearly a century of combined experience to distilling research and telling this story in a way invaluable to Louisianans, to policymakers, and to all those concerned with rising sea levels and seeking a long-term solution.
232 pages, Hardcover
Published February 6, 2017
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
February 22, 2017
GNab I received a free electronic copy of this study from Netgalley, Carl A. Brasseaux, and University Press of Mississippi. Thank you all, for sharing your fine work with me.
This is an extensive look into the damage done to the Mississippi delta region by previous damming and leveeing over the last century and more, in an effort to relieve flooding. This is the same sort of damage you will see in western river basins after damming, multiplied by x5 or x8 due to the massive amount of water and soil that annually travel down the Mississippi - the nation’s largest drainage basin drains about 41% of the contiguous United States into the Gulf of Mexico at an average rate of 470,000 cubic feet per second. Because the water doesn't slow and dabble as it once did all the soil and minerals wind up in the Gulf of Mexico - and Louisiana at the current escalating level of loss is in serious trouble. Between 1956 and 1978 more than 294,000 acres of coastal marsh (460 square miles) became open water. We continue to lose 18 to 22 square miles per year.
Add in misuse of the land, storm surges and hurricane damage. Since 1947 Louisiana has suffered through Hurricanes Flossy, Audrey, Ethel, Carla, Hilda, Betsy and Camille, Juan, Andrew, Georges, Isadore, Ivan, Cindy, Ernesto, Katrina, Rita, Gustav, Ike, Irene, etc. Each onslaught of storm surge destroys more of the coastline, marshes and trembling prairies, and allows a creeping front of salt water to moving inland.
"Dozens of 19th century communities including St. Malo, Manila Village, Bassa-Bassa, Alluvial City, Coon Road, Daisy, Chong Song, Cabinish, Camp Dewey, Dunbar, Falia, Balize, Avoca Island, Nichols, Ostrica, Seabreeze, Doullet's Canal, Oysterville, Perry, English Lookout, Fisherman's Village, Cheniere Camidnada, Yankee Camp and many others - now exist only as vestigial Memories in the region's historical literature, for their respective sites now lie beneath the waves of encroaching Gulf Waters or as clusters of aging pilings. The economic infrastructure that once sustained these lost settlements has also vanished."
And then we have the Deepwater Horizon disaster.... This is not just a problem for Louisiana. Every American will be impacted in one way or another by the loss of this special place.
Pub date Feb 7, 2017
University Press of Mississippi
This is an extensive look into the damage done to the Mississippi delta region by previous damming and leveeing over the last century and more, in an effort to relieve flooding. This is the same sort of damage you will see in western river basins after damming, multiplied by x5 or x8 due to the massive amount of water and soil that annually travel down the Mississippi - the nation’s largest drainage basin drains about 41% of the contiguous United States into the Gulf of Mexico at an average rate of 470,000 cubic feet per second. Because the water doesn't slow and dabble as it once did all the soil and minerals wind up in the Gulf of Mexico - and Louisiana at the current escalating level of loss is in serious trouble. Between 1956 and 1978 more than 294,000 acres of coastal marsh (460 square miles) became open water. We continue to lose 18 to 22 square miles per year.
Add in misuse of the land, storm surges and hurricane damage. Since 1947 Louisiana has suffered through Hurricanes Flossy, Audrey, Ethel, Carla, Hilda, Betsy and Camille, Juan, Andrew, Georges, Isadore, Ivan, Cindy, Ernesto, Katrina, Rita, Gustav, Ike, Irene, etc. Each onslaught of storm surge destroys more of the coastline, marshes and trembling prairies, and allows a creeping front of salt water to moving inland.
"Dozens of 19th century communities including St. Malo, Manila Village, Bassa-Bassa, Alluvial City, Coon Road, Daisy, Chong Song, Cabinish, Camp Dewey, Dunbar, Falia, Balize, Avoca Island, Nichols, Ostrica, Seabreeze, Doullet's Canal, Oysterville, Perry, English Lookout, Fisherman's Village, Cheniere Camidnada, Yankee Camp and many others - now exist only as vestigial Memories in the region's historical literature, for their respective sites now lie beneath the waves of encroaching Gulf Waters or as clusters of aging pilings. The economic infrastructure that once sustained these lost settlements has also vanished."
And then we have the Deepwater Horizon disaster.... This is not just a problem for Louisiana. Every American will be impacted in one way or another by the loss of this special place.
Pub date Feb 7, 2017
University Press of Mississippi
February 18, 2017
I recall hearing a story years ago on NPR regarding LA's disappearing coast. What stuck with me was the idea that the "boot" we are all familiar with from maps isn't as "boot-like" as it once was. Just for an idea of what I'm talking about, here is an image from the USGS publication Louisiana Coastal Wetlands: A Resource At Risk.
Crazy right? This book is the first in a series to be published by the University of Mississippi about the disappearing coastal mashes of Louisiana. Their intent is to influence the bureaucratic machine that is currently making major decisions affecting the coast without understanding what they are doing. This first installment gives a primer on coastal erosion and the manmade systems in place, as well as the history of industrialization and agriculture in the state.
Being honest, I'm not sure that I understand much more about the problem than I did before. The chapter on the history of LA's mashes and waterways went above my head in several places and wasn't especially easy for me to understand. The chapters on industrialization and agriculture were very interesting and they gave a general idea of how each industry affected coastal erosion. The last chapter was the most impactful since it mainly concerned the damage that storms and levy systems have wrought upon the coast. At the end the authors even list over 20 coastal communities that don't even exist anymore because they are underwater.
Under. Water. Ya'll.
And maybe it's just my fear of the ocean, but that is scary in a real way. Places that just don't even exist anymore because the ocean is slowly encroaching and we have systematically destroyed the natural systems that kept this from happening for centuries.
I'm looking forward to the rest of this series being published because I feel like the authors have a lot more to say. A lot of the photos and documents shown throughout are from the authors private collection so they clearly are passionate about stopping LA's coastal erosion. Definitely worth a read if you are even remotely interested in the topic.
Review also posted on my blog.
Copy courtesy of University Press of Mississippi/America's Third Coast Series, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
Crazy right? This book is the first in a series to be published by the University of Mississippi about the disappearing coastal mashes of Louisiana. Their intent is to influence the bureaucratic machine that is currently making major decisions affecting the coast without understanding what they are doing. This first installment gives a primer on coastal erosion and the manmade systems in place, as well as the history of industrialization and agriculture in the state.
Being honest, I'm not sure that I understand much more about the problem than I did before. The chapter on the history of LA's mashes and waterways went above my head in several places and wasn't especially easy for me to understand. The chapters on industrialization and agriculture were very interesting and they gave a general idea of how each industry affected coastal erosion. The last chapter was the most impactful since it mainly concerned the damage that storms and levy systems have wrought upon the coast. At the end the authors even list over 20 coastal communities that don't even exist anymore because they are underwater.
Under. Water. Ya'll.
And maybe it's just my fear of the ocean, but that is scary in a real way. Places that just don't even exist anymore because the ocean is slowly encroaching and we have systematically destroyed the natural systems that kept this from happening for centuries.
I'm looking forward to the rest of this series being published because I feel like the authors have a lot more to say. A lot of the photos and documents shown throughout are from the authors private collection so they clearly are passionate about stopping LA's coastal erosion. Definitely worth a read if you are even remotely interested in the topic.
Review also posted on my blog.
Copy courtesy of University Press of Mississippi/America's Third Coast Series, via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.
November 3, 2016
Scary. It’s a battle between hurricanes (mother nature), vs. over use of land and sea (mans greed), and man still trying to control the land (more greed, dams and levees). Take a wild guess who’s winning? Highly recommend.
good luck
**ARC/publisher/NetGalley
good luck
**ARC/publisher/NetGalley
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews