The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1910-06-12
VAST TRACT TO Be
CLEARED OF WATER
Marshland About New Orleans
To Be Drained
MEANS MUCH FOR CITY
VIII Do Away With Breeding Ground
of Countless Billions of Mosque
toes and City VIII Have
Many Suburbs
BY WALTER PARKER

New Orleans, June 11.-(Special.) -More
than 100000 acres of marshland lying
within so miles of New Orleans is to be
drained, reclaimed. and transformed from
wilderness In to gardens, homes, ham
lets and towns. The work of retaining
some $4,000 acres within the corporate
limits of New Orleans is we'll under way,
while contracts have been let for the
reclamation of fully 100000 acres addl-
tional In adjoining parishes.
This means that within two years the
alligator will no longer find aboriginal
harborage in the Carnival City; that the
breeding grounds of countless billions Of
mosquitoes will be turned into highly
productive farms on which mosquitoes
cannot breed; that hundreds of miles or
paved roadways will lead from New Or
leans north, east and west. and that for
the first time in it's history New Orleans
will possess suburbs.
Every visitor to New Orleans remem-
bers the vast expanse of unproductive
marshland that extends to the very house
yards of the settled portions of the city
on every side, and the landscape view
from the car window has never been
good advertisement for the Gateway to
the Valley" All this is now being
changed Just as fast as steam dredges
and electric drainage machines can do
the work
The corporate limits of New Orleans
cover 165 square miles. Five years ago
the geographical center of the city was
~. ;,.t,e ~ 1.x, too
tors and crawfish and other crawling and
swimming things. Today handsome
homes and smooth roadways cover 1t.
Three years ago an s00O-acre marsh I'M
mediately to the eastward of the settled
portion of the city could not be traversed
by man without the aid Of a pirogue.
This year four crops of vegetables are
being raised on many acres, and next
year many thrifty farmers will be grow
ing highly profitable food crops thereon
in great profusion. Immediately beyond
this tract work has just been begun on
the reclamation of more than $4,000 acres,
and provision has been made for the open
ing up of more than 100 miles of wide
paved boulevards along the shore OF
Lakes Pontchartrain and Borgne. All OF
this Is within the cooperate limits of New
Orleans. All of the railroads entering
from the east pass through these tracts
To the westward the same character OF
work Is being done, and preparations are
now being made to reclaim an additional
half million acres through the construc-
ton of a wide levee along the western
shore of Lake Pontchartrain and the
southern shore of Lake Maurepas On
the crown of this levee paved roadway
75 miles in length will connect New Or
leans and Baton Rouge and ultimately
will be the southern terminus OF Chi
cago-New Orleans highway.
The nearest town or settlement of any
consequence is now so miles distant from
New Orleans. Within so miles of every
other large city In the country million
or more people reside, and many indus
tries develop business and wealth for the
urban population.
This is the end New Orleans Is working
to and will have reached In large part
anyway by the time the Panama canal
Is opened to the ships of the world.
Meanwhile modern sewerage and drain
age within the city proper have practi-
cally and wholly solved the city's sani-
tary problems, and the discovery OF
simple method of f1ltering the waters OF
the Mississippi river has given the city a
pure water service excelled by none in
the world These systems are In opera
ton and are nearly complete. They have
cost the city about S25,000,000.
Public ownership of wharves and har-
Dor facilities and a publicly owned belt
railroad, all paid for by the taxpayers
and operated by public commissions In
the interest of the ports commerce, are
fast increasing that commerce In both
value and volume.
Big projects still under discussion in
clude plan to erect a monster system
of commodity warehouses on the river
'front.' where the ships may land on one
side and all railroads enter on the other,
and plan for a steamship line between
New Orleans and the Orient through the
Panama canal. The warehouse system is
to be built by a public commission. The
steamship line is impossible under exist
ing federal maritime laws but the peo-
pie of New Orleans have planned to over
come the federal handicap in the Amer
lean merchant marine by exempting the
proposed steamship corporation from tax
alton for 10 years, and by other material
concessions.
Warren B. Reed, one of the engineers
who are fast turning New Orleans marsh
land into the highest type of farm land
and suburban home sites, says the ex-
pense and difficulties of such reclamation
are far less than are the expense and
difficulties incident to the irrigation OF
arid lands of the west.
''Levees, drainage bitches and pump
ing machines dTe oil that wv ASHuAASi
said Mr.. Reed, ito keep the water off this
land We merely lift the water over the
nearest levee and that Is an end to IT.
Three or four months after these lands
are drained they are ready for the piow.
In the west, Where irrigation is resorted
to, water is often conveyed more than 100
miles. Our goal is the diversion of many
thousands of the western farmers now
emigrating to Canada by bringing them
to Louisiana. where the climate is mild,
the soil rich. and four crops a year may
be raised"
OF the many millions of northern cap
ital now pouring into Louisiana seeking
land development investments, Lynn II.
Dinlzins president OF the Interstate Trust
and Banking company, said:
1.-TWO years ago Louisiana removed the
tax on real estate mortgage loans, and
Immediately large financiers in the north
turned their eyes on Louisiana. With
out difficulty New Orleans can now Sc
cure and supply all the land development
money on favorable terms that the state
of Louisiana may need"
These several potential activities are
the cause. not the result, Of New Or
leans efforts to secure the Worlds Pan
anna exposition in 1915. The recent visit
to Washington of the entire Louisiana
legislature and many prominent citizens
to present New Orleans claims to Con-
gress after the legislature had voted ia
vorably on 100000 exposition tax, was
merely a spectacular demonstration OF
RAPIDLY developing enterprise In Louisi-
ana.
IT will guarantee that the exposition
visitors to New Orleans in 1915 from the
northern and eastern states will enter the
CITY through beautiful gardens and pros
perous farms, and I believe my brother
en- gineers who are working on the same
in, r1lch fOr