Samedi

Flashback, 1950: Suburbanizing
New Orleans: the end of Charity?
~Patrice Frey
~The current LSU and VA development plan abandons Charity Hospital, one of New Orleans’ most iconic buildings, in favor of a disjointed and sprawling medical campus located to the west of the Charity and Tulane Hospital (see the proposed development plan.) To make way for this decidedly retrograde development, over 250 homes and commercial buildings in the Lower Mid-City neighborhood will be demolished. (Approximately 165 of these buildings are historic, and the National Trust named Charity Hospital and the adjacent Lower Mid-City neighborhood to its 2008 list of America’s 11 Most Endangered Historic Places.) Stunning.
That’s the best word I can think of to describe the irresponsibility of the proposed development. In a city that has suffered so much loss, so much devastation, how can the further destruction of a viable neighborhood be justified? And for what gain?
~Here is a viable alternative that includes rebuilding Charity Hospital as a world-class institution.

In north Lafourche, floodwaters still threaten homes
~Raymond Legendre

"With trenches full of poets...
Spanish songs in Granada,
oh mi corazón"
~Your Right Hand Thief

Judith Owen and Harry Shearer Holiday Sing-Along