Dam, Did Levees Just Kill the Trinity River Project?

The results of a U.S. Army Corp of Engineers survey on Dallas' Trinity River levees could prove to be the end of the much-debated Trinity River Project.

Last night, we reported the Corp of Engineers found 34 flaws in the over 170 levees along the Trinity River in Dallas. The results of those findings sent many into a frenzy, including two posts from the Dallas Observer's Unfair Park blog, and one from the Texas Watchdog blog, just to name a few.

The most dam-ing of the posts (pun intended) came from City Council member Angela Hunt, who posted on her site: "The fact is, this toll road project is dead."

The facts are these: the Corp said parts of Dallas can't survive a flood with the levees we have now, and there's not enough money to fix the levees and build the toll road. This is the hard line that anti-toll road forces can now easily draw in the sand...until that sand is washed away by a flood.

It's easy to say the levees will be fine when we're in a drought, but many Dallasites remember Katrina well -- we had to take in refugees when those levees collapsed -- so any resources allocated to building a road versus protecting the public should be examined closely.

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