Louisiana looks like a boot, right? That’s what they taught us elementary school.
But nowadays Louisiana actually looks like this:
Blame coastal erosion, climate change, and oil and gas production.
So, why is it that, on every U.S. map and highway sign, on every T-shirt and in online quizzes asking you to identify state’s by their outline, Louisiana’s iconic book shape looks just like it did in 1930s?
Brett Anderson, New Orleans’s award-winning restaurant critic, spent months on a quixotic quest to find out the answer. During the course of his investigation, Jerome Zeringue, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal’s executive assistant for coastal activities, acknowledged that the state’s current map is deceptive. Of the existing map, Zeringue said, “People get a false sense of security, they see these topographic maps, they see these solid platforms of marsh that aren’t there… it’s a false reality.”
Learn more about why Louisiana need to change the map.
