[StBernard] St. Bernard charrettes focusing on whole parish

[Westley Annis]

St. Bernard charrettes focusing on whole parish
Public input sought on all neighborhoods 
Thursday, March 09, 2006
By Karen Turni Bazile
St. Bernard/Plaquemines bureau 
Town planner Andres Duany and nearly 20 architects and other planners are in
St. Bernard Parish studying its neighborhoods and asking for citizens' input
to design a rebuilding plan for the parish. 

 
The group's work is being financed by the Louisiana Recovery Authority,
which has sponsored two other planning sessions, called charrettes, in New
Iberia and Lake Charles. 

Duany, of Duany Plater-Zyberk Architects and Town Planners, led a series of
meetings with local officials and community leaders Wednesday. That came
after an impromptu parish tour this weekend during which he met residents to
get a feel for the character of the neighborhoods and what drives them to
live in St. Bernard. 

He plans to use the information from residents and officials to draw a
workable plan to improve the community as it rebuilds from Hurricane
Katrina. Nearly every parish home and business was flooded. 

Duany, who also led charrettes in 11 Mississippi coastal towns in October,
met with several hundred residents at an opening presentation and town
meeting at the St. Bernard courthouse Tuesday night. Many residents talked
about wanting to rebuild the community they described as a wonderful,
family-oriented suburb. 

But Duany told them the parish needs to improve as it recovers. 

"Your population has been stagnant for some time. If you are as good as you
say you are, then something is holding you back as a community," Duany said.


"I believe you have a dysfunctional zoning code that allows anything to be
built along Judge Perez," Duany said. The street, one of two main east-west
thoroughfares, has become a hodgepodge of haphazardly developed commercial
and residential properties on what should be the main commercial roadway in
the parish. 

Duany said he will offer to assist in rewriting the local zoning laws to
provide more uniform and practical development. 

Tom Low, one of the project directors, met Wednesday with officials from
Jackson Barracks, where plans are under way to restore the Louisiana
National Guard's headquarters, which stretches from the Mississippi River to
the 40-Arpent Canal just west of Arabi. 

Low is working to design a layout whose initial plans are to restore the
buildings that were built in the 1830s and 1930s nearest to the river and
demolish some of the newer buildings that had significant flood damage. 

Although Duany initially was to focus on the historic neighborhood of Old
Arabi near the river, the effort now is focusing on the whole parish. 

Duany's team fanned out into the parish to dissect the neighborhoods and get
a feel for what types of homes are in each area and what types of damage or
recovery each section is facing. 

"It is a parish of neighborhoods," Duany said at a meeting Wednesday. "Each
is technically different, and we are trying to assess the worth" of the
neighborhoods to determine which are areas with homes that are financially
worth saving and which are areas that should be built with elevated homes or
with different types of building materials. 

Low said the planners are hoping to take what they hear at these meetings
and fashion it into a concrete plan for rebuilding -- neighborhood by
neighborhood. 

The effort will culminate with a public forum Friday at 6 p.m. at the parish
courthouse. 

Low said citizen attendance is critical at what is being called a "pin-up
and review community input" meeting, because the team will present several
options for rebuilding, and planners will be looking for feedback to direct
the final plan that will be presented Wednesday at 6 p.m. at the courthouse.


For information on the charrettes, visit www.louisianaspeaks.org. 

. . . . . . . 


Karen Turni Bazile can be reached at kturni at timespicayune.com or (504)
352-2539.