Gulf Coast Cities Draw Up New Blueprints

PASS CHRISTIAN, Miss. –

Hurricane Katrina erased much of the Mississippi Gulf Coast’s past, but the deadly storm also created a blank canvas and a historic opportunity for reinventing cities like this once-quaint beach community.

Two years after Katrina claimed more than 200 lives in Mississippi and left behind billions of dollars in damage, teams of visionary urban planners are embedded in Pass Christian and other coastal cities, helping them draft ambitious blueprints for rebuilding the “New Urbanism” way.


New Urbanism – an architectural movement to transform sprawling city blocks into compact, walkable neighborhoods with old-fashioned features – is only one of the dynamics that could define Mississippi’s coastline.

Traditionalists are pursuing a competing vision: Rebuilding the coast largely the way it was before the Aug. 29, 2005, hurricane. Part of what has been called the Redneck Riviera, it was an eclectic assembly of glitzy casino barges, brightly painted beach shops and aging motels occasionally broken by stretches of stately old homes with oak shaded lawns overlooking the sandy, manmade beach.

Which vision will the coast resemble in 2015, when Katrina is just a painful, 10-year-old memory?

AP