Ike Dike: Bigger push needed to get funding.
GALVESTON — New Orleans has a new, $17.5 billion storm-protection system, but the Houston area can’t get $6 billion for the proposed “Ike Dike” due to lack of commitment by area leaders, the originator of the dike concept said Thursday.
“It’s a matter of political will,” said Bill Merrell, a marine science professor at Texas A&MUniversity, pointing out that the federal government financed 100 percent of the New Orleans storm barrier.
“They gave New York $20 billion (after Hurricane Sandy), why can’t they give us $4 billion to $5 billion?” asked Merrell. “We ought to be outraged.”
During a news conference on the eve of Fri- day’s fifth anniversary of Hurricane Ike, Merrell and others urged the construction of a barrier that would block another storm surge.
If a barrier is built, “We wouldn’t have to go through recovery again, we wouldn’t have to see people die, we wouldn’t have to evacuate people from the hospital,” Merrell said. Competing ideas
The proposed barrier, popularly known as the Ike Dike, would stretch from San Luis Pass at the western end of Galveston Island to High Island on the eastern end of the Bolivar Peninsula. Skeptics have said the idea is too costly. Merrell said studies by Texas A&MGalveston have found the barrier would cost between $4 billion and $5 billion.
Merrell proposed the concept soon after Ike caused an estimated $25 billion in damage to the Houston area, making it the costliest storm in Texas history.
Galveston Mayor Lewis Rosen and state Sen. Larry Taylor, RFriendswood. spoke in favor of the Ike Dike at the news conference.
The dike ran into competition from a plan by Rice University’s Severe Storm Prediction, Education and Evacuation from Disasters Center, known as the SSPEED Center, that envisioned levees along Texas 146 and around Galveston Island as well as a storm-surge gate at the Hartmann bridge protecting the Houston Ship Channel.
The SSPEED Center since has backed off from the levee plans to focus on the gate, which it has dubbed the Centennial Gate. The Center now views the Centennial Gate as complementary to rather than in competition with the Ike Dike.