For starters, there were thousands of low-income, frail or ill residents in New Orleans without a means of transportation, without funds or without any place to go. The city offered them shelter in the Superdome and that seemed like a reasonable solution.
But clearly there were thousands of others who could have gotten into cars and gone. Yet, despite the dire warnings, they felt they could ride out the storm in their homes. Evacuation order, shmevacuation order, as one of my friends would have put it.
What gets in the way of effective evacuation is human nature, pig-headedness, the desire to stay with pets that shelters won't take. You name it, people have a reason. Sometimes they think their house can take whatever comes their way. A lot of times they just don't believe the warnings. Weather forecasters warn of calamity while the skies are blue and the sun is shining. Nine times out of 10--well, maybe seven or eight during the past two hurricane seasons--the storm veers off and disaster is averted.
Unfortunately, Katrina was a 10 and the warnings were all too true. Does this mean that all along the Gulf Coast and Eastern Seaboard residents with the means to leave have learned the lesson and will jump in the car as soon as the next warnings come? I highly doubt it. Earlier this summer, I wrote a short article [Hurricane Hubris] about this dilemma and steps that cities can take to get more people to leave.
But in the end, there will always be the Doubting Thomases, Fido's friends and the tough-as-nails folks. Sometimes they'll get lucky. But sometimes they'll get Katrina. Or her sister.
