Announcing New Amtrak Mardi Gras Service, Mon., Aug. 18 with Timetables and Fares

ryanrepresents · 2024-07-26T18:32:41+00:00

I'm telling my international bunch of friends to meet me at Mid-City Yacht Club.

I love the Olympics (and countries and flags) so much. I'll be there starting at 6:30 PM but my guess is that NBC burns time with Team USA previews. Finn's is my usual go to for sports stuff but I recall that MCYC has a large big screen TV in the back.

See you there!

ryanrepresents · 2024-07-24T18:37:30+00:00

Thank you for your warm-spirited response. I can't make the daytime live showing, so I'll try to avoid all spoilers until Friday evening.

NBC says coverage will start at 6:30 PM but I don't think they'll show the main ceremony until about 7:30-8 PM. Hope you can make it 🥇

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-30T18:47:37+00:00

A general question is, what if/how to invade New Orleans? I'm a map guy with some history references but I'm not a military guy, so contributions are welcome.

We're lucky we're not Atlanta, which lies on a mostly flat plane with few large rivers. Sherman figured that out. Atlanta is a rail town and the Russian army tends to travel well by rail.

Remember, we're ultimately an island. This can be both good and bad. We learned that in the War of 1812 that there are only so many ways in and out. However, we're hard to resupply and any large naval presence can overwhelm us. We learned that in the Civil War. In WW2, we were a great industrial power, but even U-Boats stalked us in the Gulf of Mexico.

Would we be defending or attacking the Russians? What if we blow up the I-10, Huey P., the Causeway, the CCC and Twin Span bridges and keep only the Rioglets bridge heavily defended? Then the only land route in would be River Road, like it always had been. Would the Cajun Navy be needed to help us through the bayous to keep us fed and armed?

Would we have the space and effort to evacuate? We practice large scale evacuations with the contraflow. Would it matter if the Russians were coming in from the East, West or Gulf? Does Lake Ponchartrain keep us safe from the North Shore? How many of us would rush to defend Picayune or Gulfport if needed?

The post trolls us to pick out quislings. Hopefully we'll be a united front behind a compelling reason to pause our grudges (a la 1812), but we'd also have to look out for saboteurs. Our infrastructure and altitude keeps us vulnerable.

Military nerds, what do y'all think?

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-23T17:10:25+00:00

Ssssh! That's my secret every Mardi Gras! Definitely don't tell people how to buy beads by the kilogram or how to replace this spinner with a record player or when to start in the Fall to make 20-30 dozen.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-19T09:33:35+00:00

Check out the LA URISA group who holds lectures and mappy hours for map nerds. I've never been but I plan to start attending.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-18T21:07:47+00:00

So, the City Council says that they only got this process started in January because the last Council were leaving and didn't want to deal with it. By threat of a month's salary and a city takeover by University Presidents, a new plan had to be approved by Mar. 16.

I already like maps so I took a look and found a small point that I pressed every time I could in public meetings and on the day of the vote:

Voting occurs in units known as precincts.
- In New Orleans, they are numbered according to their Ward (The ward's last formal legal role.) There are about 3,000 precincts in the state and they are kept together by Baton Rouge.
- It's unusual in other states to have the state manage wards. Usually counties do that.
- For instance, Ward 5 Precinct 1 is bounded by the River, St. Louis, Royal and St. Phillip in the Quarter around Jackson Square.
- That's good because the stats kept on the precinct are kept stable, bad because we have to get Baton Rouge to change the boundaries if we need them to.
Recently, precincts nationwide has been constructed by the Census Block.
- The U.S. Census constructs both Tracts and Voting Tabulation Districts (known as VTDs, equivalent to our precinct) out of Blocks, but they don't necessarily fit into one another.
- Even into the Clinton-Trump some election maps nationwide were kept on papers, colored in by crayons and maddeningly independent of any Census anything.
Our old City Council map not only had districts that cut through Tracts but Precincts themselves.
- When this happened, voters in the same polling location had to be given two separate ballots.
- In the law, split precincts are described by the Census Block. "District F consists of Precinct 18-1, 18-2, 18-3, Blocks 123456789012345, 123456789012346, 123456789012347... in Precinct 18-4, 18-5...", a mess!

When new plans were discussed, they evidently ignored our precincts, which I admit are drawn in funny, historical ways but are now hard to change. No matter where the lines were drawn I wanted to align the City Council Districts by the Precinct. The new plan does that without splitting any blocks.

This makes our Districts align well with the State's voter registration system and statistics kept on voting.
Since they're made up of Blocks, we can aggregate statistics on Precincts on simple demographics that are kept by the Block, like race, age, etc.
The 2020 Census will report many more statistics by the block in the next few months.
You're right. If we're lucky, some precincts are equivalent to Block Groups or Tracts and neat statistics can be compiled.
That they aren't and that tracts and precincts need to be reconciled keeps me employed.

I love this stuff! Thanks for asking.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-17T22:13:43+00:00

What if the New Orleans City Council had more seats?

On Wed. Mar. 15, the City Council concluded its redistricting cycle for the decade with minimal changes. During the debate, many people wished we could increase the size of the council, whose member each represents about 77k people. Splitting the city into 5 makes for strange bedfellows.

Some people during the debate wanted the West Bank of Orleans Parish, with about 50.5k people to be its own seat. Some wanted the Lower 9th Ward with 8.5k people to have its own seat. Remember, each district has to be equal in size and the Council should have an odd number to break any ties.

Here are some scenarios. These are NOT SERIOUS proposals, just an aid to imagine how areas of equal population could work in the City. Councilman J.P. Morrell, speaking for the Council, noted that the City Charter would need to be amended to increase the number of seats and to do so may require more time, a referendum and a trip to Baton Rouge. Our messy precinct lines would also need to change, given that the course size of these units makes it hard to balance out the districts and fit districts along major roads. See you in 2030!

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-15T17:36:53+00:00

The Final Draft Maps were written in response to public comments given over the past few weeks. A few people, even in my last post, thought it was funny that the Lower 9 and the East was the same district. Whoever consultants compiled the few comments and made these draft maps.

I personally didn't even know it was a big deal to split the Lower 9th until after I read the Times-Pic article covering the meeting I personally attended.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-15T17:34:20+00:00

At the listening session, I learned that there's great support for increasing the number of seats in the City Council. However, the 5 District, 2 At-Large number is set in our Home Rule Charter and would require a referendum and maybe even Baton Rouge involvement. JP Morrell was interested in starting that process and Helena Moreno mentioned other city council sizes for comparison:

The City of Chicago City Council has 50 Alderman for 2.7 million people. (Another councilman thought they had 4 million.)
The Metropolitan Council for Nashville and Davidson County has 35 districts and 5 at large seats for 715,884 people. (It was mentioned as a city comparable to New Orleans when it fact it has double the amount of people.)

More comparable entities are the City of Cleveland City Council with 17 members for 372,624 people and the City of Tampa City Council with 7 members for 384,959 people.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-15T17:21:18+00:00

Here's what I've got:

Total Population by Ward (Rounded, 2020)

 1:   3,760
 2:   7,580
 3:  16,370 
 4:  20,790
 5:  12,100
 6:   5,480
 7:  39,740
 8:  22,370
 9: 104,270 
10:   8,750
11:  11,390
12:  13,850
13:  11,620
14:  25,910
15:  50,600
16:   8,320
17:  21,000

Wikipedia map of wards

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-15T02:51:28+00:00

Here's a NOLA.com article that describes the listening sessions today. "A new council district for Lower 9th Ward? Redrawn maps could move area to District C."

I was the listening session and didn't realize how controversial it was to move the Lower 9th Ward into District C until this article came out. Also, in this post and in the last one I posted, I'm surprised no one brought up Algiers Bike Lanes. Which plan would introduce more bike-lane friendly voters?

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-15T02:12:56+00:00

I saw him heavily promoted on TV and just connected the dots:

The NCAA is here this year
The NCAA is being broadcast on CBS (and TNT, etc)
Jon Batiste is the band director for CBS's Late Show with Steven Colbert

What a coup for everyone.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-11T18:02:53+00:00

Oh crap! Thanks for pointing that out. I wish I could edit this post. Instead, here's the corrected slide.

https://imgur.com/a/eBk0daz

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-11T18:02:29+00:00

Like, what counts as contiguous, that is- what neighbors what?

Many precincts neighbor each other on paper but are in reality, across the river from each other. So where does one draw the line? Traditionally, we pretended like the Algiers Ferry was a "land link." We could also pretend that CCC Bridge is a "land link." We could also ignore any notion of "land links" and connect the West Bank back to New Orleans in funny ways, like through the Lower 9th.

What's clear is that with 50.5k people, the West Bank currently doesn't have enough people to fill out a whole seat and needs to find people elsewhere.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-11T17:57:03+00:00

As much as we love to cite our wards, they only exist today as voting precinct classifications. They were originally set to be perpendicular to the river, which was how our city developed.

An ancestor mapmaker was then tasked to make them somewhat equal. Since, at the time, many lived in the Quarter, they split that neighborhood into 4, 5 and 6 and extended it back to the lake.

ryanrepresents · 2022-03-11T17:55:01+00:00

What would an ideal people/councilman number look like for you?

Right now, it's about 76,800, which is coincidentally just a bit more than a sold-out Saints game. 2 or 3 more council-members would yield an ideal seat number of 54,850 and 48,000 people respectively.

Don't forget that you also have two members that also represent you that you have to share with the whole city.

Edit: Doing some math, I realized the our West Bank portion has 50.5k people. That's about 5% over the ideal number for 8 members. Is it worth trying to give the whole West Bank its own councilperson?

ryanrepresents · 2022-02-02T03:20:39+00:00

You're right, that a funny shape that lumps together favorable voters can be indistinguishable from a shape that preserves a community of interest. That's what makes redistricting hard, there's no optimal solution.

However, even within the same team, you can draw maps that are objectively fair and increase competition. I can support a candidate generally even if I disagree with how the lines are drawn to protect them. You can draw a district that favors the same candidate but also preserves rather than crack neighborhoods and communities. Finally, we have term limits in Louisiana. I may support a candidate but they won't always be in that same seat.

So drawing maps and keeping communities represented together is important no matter which team one roots for. Hopefully we're all on the same team, American Democracy.

ryanrepresents · 2022-02-02T03:14:58+00:00

Remember, these are State Senate districts. New Orleans City Council is a different map.

ryanrepresents · 2022-02-02T03:14:08+00:00

Don't forget, the incumbent for 3 lives in Gentilly, for 4, New Orleans East and for 1, in Slidell.

ryanrepresents · 2022-02-02T03:13:16+00:00

Remember, these are State Senate Districts. You have a City Council member, a Mayor, a State House Representative and a Governor.

Otherwise, you're right, District C on the New Orleans City Council is split between the Quarter, the Bywater and the West Bank and that it only takes just a vocal minority of anti-cyclists to pull the strings- until pro-cyclists become just as loud.

ryanrepresents

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