3:00 p.m., Friday, September  5, 2008 

(Updates posted three times daily or more frequently if major news warrants)

The city of New Orleans and the metropolitan area continues to move forward wonderfully in its post-Gustav recovery. Residents from across the metropolitan area, including surrounding parishes, have begun to return to homes and businesses.

Hotels and restaurants are rapidly re-opening throughout the downtown tourism corridor. Many hotels are honoring their weekend reservations as normal. Please check with your individual hotel for their status prior to coming. Some hotels have opened their reservation systems today, but most will open for new reservations tomorrow or Saturday. Business next week and the weekend of the 12th to 14th should be completely unaffected. All attractions, the airport and air service, hotels, and restaurants should be fully open. The airport is fully operational and back in service now.

Scores of top New Orleans restaurants are opening over the next two days in preparation for the normal weekend influx of visitors and frequent dining locals.

The offices of the Convention and Visitors Bureau will not re-open until Monday, September 8, to allow our employees to safely return home over the next few days and take care of their personal business. Schools throughout Southeast Louisiana remain closed until September 8 as well.

PLEASE KNOW THAT ALTHOUGH OUR OFFICES ARE CLOSED, MOST CVB EMPLOYEES ARE WORKING REMOTELY TO ENSURE THE CONTINUATION OF SERVICES TO OUR CLIENTS AND FRIENDS.

The biggest challenge remaining now for New Orleans after the superb execution of our emergency and evacuation plans is the restoration of power to neighborhoods, as outages still exist in parts of the city and in adjoining parishes. Estimates are that power will be fully restored to the neighborhoods within 60 hours or earlie. The downtown, business district, French Quarter, Warehouse and Arts District, Convention Center, Harrahs and the Superdome look terrific and most of those areas never lost power even during the height of the storm.

GOOD NEWS:

As our team walks around the French Quarter, Convention Center area, Warehouse and Arts District, and the downtown we see that the city looks amazing in the tourist corridor.
The only thing missing is our fabulous workers, musicians and especially YOU! All of that should change by the weekend as citizens and workers pour back into the city and head to work to prepare for your return.

There is little to no disruption in meetings and conventions scheduled over the next two weeks nor to special events. The Convention Center, Superdome, and major hotels suffered only minor damage such as a few window breaks and all repairs are expected to be accomplished in the next few hours to few days. There is no mid-range or long-term impact of any kind.

The Louis Armstrong International Airport is now operational and they expect to resume more routine airline traffic today. The first flight back in to New Orleans arrived Wednesday evening. The schedule today will be slightly reduced, but should resume a full schedule within a day or two.

The Audubon Nature Institute announced the reopening of the Aquarium of the Americas and the IMAX Theatre on Saturday with a special admission fee of $5. The world famous Audubon Zoo sustained very little damage. All animals are safe and the Zoo hopes to re-open in a matter of days.

The Harrah's Casino will reopen Saturday.

The New Orleans Saints and the Louisiana Superdome announced yesterday afternoon that the Saints will open their NFL season on Sunday in the Superdome, playing Tampa Bay.  A good number of restaurants are planning openings beginning Thursday and a large number should be back by the weekend.

We anticipate that in just a matter of days, New Orleans will be back in business! As more residents and employees from the various sectors of the hospitality industry are able to return, we expect the gradual reopening of hotels and restaurants. We strongly advise that anyone with plans to travel to New Orleans this weekend, whether for pleasure or business, consult with their respective hotels to check the status of each individual property.

Many hotels will open this weekend. Most others will follow Monday or so. In fact a number of weddings are going on as planned this weekend in New Orleans. As well as the Saints game of course!

SEE YOU SOON!
Thank you for checking on New Orleans! Thank you for wishing us good luck. We were fully prepared and ready. But we look forward mostly to getting back to work shortly at the one thing we love more than any other....showing off the world's best food, music, museums, attractions and art scene of America's most historic, authentic, walkable city.

Downtown Updates
Click here for info from the Downtown Development District

What follows is information that was posted since Monday, September 1, so that you can follow our progress and communications.


TUESDAY'S DEVELOPOMENTS:
The city of New Orleans proved to be exceptionally well prepared for the wind and rain of Hurricane Gustav which struck Monday morning. The evacuation of some 30,000 visitors to the city this past weekend in less than 24 hours went exceptionally well and almost flawlessly followed the emergency plan established after Hurricane Katrina. Only very minor logistical tweaking was necessary as the plan worked even better all had hoped.

As of Tuesday morning, New Orleans is coming back strong. Half of the city and most of the downtown, Quarter and Warehouse District have power and officials continue to work hard to restore power city-wide. Officials also continue to assess the effects of Gustav on the city. Hotels are also conducting assessments and will inform the CVB of their status over the next 48 hours. Early indications are that damage is very minor and easily repaired and many hotels are considering reopening to the public this weekend or early next week depending on the re-entry announcements, and the amount of damage in other areas of the city found during assessments today.

The levees have proven strong as they held throughout the storm and continue to do so. While news reports showed the "overtopping" of the Industrial Canal during the midday hours on Monday, given the nature of the storm and its close proximity to New Orleans, the situation was monitored closely and resulted in very minor flooding on the streets immediately paralleling the canal. The protective measures put in place served their purpose well and handled all that Gustav brought with regard to surge.

The Louisiana Superdome and the Convention Center remain in great shape with no damage to their structures. Neither facility served as shelters and were protected 24/7 by the Louisiana National  guard and State Police and NOPD.

Regional Vice President of SMG and General Manager of the Louisiana Superdome Doug Thornton announced this afternoon that all logistical and supply issues have been resolved and assuming the re-entry of the citizens occurs as expected this Thursday and Friday, then the home opener of the NFL season for the New Orleans Saints this Sunday against the Tampa Bay Buccaneers will go on as originally scheduled and will be a rallying cry for the population to cheer our progress through the impact of Gustav.

The city remains very safe and the law enforcement officials report that they have not had to deal with any issues related to enforcement.

We certainly look forward to New Orleans being back open and serving our visitors very soon. Please continue to check back with us as we update this information.

PREPARED:
New Orleans is now the best prepared city in the world for a major disruptive event such as this. The federal, state and local governments, in stark contrast to the unexpected events of Katrina, coordinated seamlessly the positioning of supplies, emergency personnel, public safety officers and first responders.

The city is proud to not only be the nation’s leader in fun, food, music and major cultural and sporting events, but now to be the most sophisticated destination in the world in all levels of emergency planning, execution and visitor management. 

MONDAY'S DEVELOPMENTS:
New Orleans fared extremely well Monday during the heavy winds and rain of Hurricane Gustav. In an unusual turn of events, the capital city of Baton Rouge seemed harder hit as were many coastal parishes and parts of Acadiana. Over one million Louisiana families are without power all across the state, but 50 % of New Orleans has power tonight. Though there was considerable loss of power, and minor flooding, the levees have held well with only minor overtopping in a couple of locations that will have limited duration effect. The thorough preparations paid off beautifully under real duress.

The French Quarter, Business District, and downtown fared well with most of the minor flooding, and tree and downed power line damage uptown and to the east and toward the lakefront. The next 24 hours will prove the final strength of the levee improvements on the canals protecting the East Bank of the city.

No significant damage to the hospitality infrastructure of New Orleans has been reported at this time and it is not anticipated that the storm will have any impact on the Fall convention and meetings calendar. Additional assessments of property and facilities will be made overnight and a report given on this site Tuesday morning.

A curfew is still in effect for the evening to continue the superb protection of the businesses and residences. The mayor is expected to announce on Tuesday when residents and business owners will be permitted to return to the city.

The reopening of hotels will depend on the mayor lifting the evacuation order of the city at his press conference on Tuesday. Then properties will make individual decisions as to when to reopen based on the return of staff and other variables. We will announce on this site when hotel reservation systems are reopened. In the meantime, please check with the individual property of your interest to check on existing reservations and to inquire about new reservations. Many hotels will reopen fairly quickly.

Information on the reopening of the city's large number of fine restaurants will also be posted.

TOOK WONDERFUL CARE OF OUR VISITORS:
Visitors were informed of all developments over the weekend and were encouraged to and provided the opportunity to depart a day early in advance of mandatory evacuation of the residents of the city. This was to ease their departure and make it as convenient as possible. Drive-in visitors were provided the same opportunities.

Additional transportation to Armstrong airport to supplement taxi and shuttle service was provided to ensure the easy flow of all visitors to the airport. The airlines added new sections and up-gauged equipment to ensure that all visitors were able to leave by the end of flight service at 6:00 p.m. Sunday. All operations at the airport have gone smoothly and all fly in visitors had departed by Sunday evening. The airport closed at that point and will remain closed until after the storm. Exact re-open times will be posted when that decision is made.

The only visitors remaining in the city after 6:00 p.m. Sunday were national and local media imbedded in a few select hotel properties. Hotels have now closed to the public and have fully secured and protected their facilities.

SAFE AND SECURED CITY:
A city-wide curfew from dusk to dawn has been set for the city for the duration of the storm and its immediate after effects. This will ensure the safety and protection of all local businesses and hotels, restaurants and other commercial properties. It will ensure that after the storm the city’s hospitality industry will be able to re-open relatively swiftly in fine condition.

The New Orleans Morial Convention Center and the Louisiana Superdome are well secured and protected by the National Guard and State Police and will not serve any role as evacuation centers or shelters. This will ensure that, immediately after the storm events, those facilities will be in superb shape and ready to serve our corporate and association meeting community and the myriad of sporting and other special events hosted in the Dome.

LEVEES AND FLOODING:
Hurricane Gustav has now passed through southern Louisiana. Significant rain and wind preceded it and buffeted the downtown areas.  We are closely watching the storm surge and the levels of rainfall that occurred. There has been minor overtopping of some canal walls but nothing serious at this point. Tuesday will tell the final tale.

We fully expected at least minor flooding in the city due to extensive rain. This is a New Orleans norm even during non-storm times. State and local officials were particularly concerned about flooding on the West Bank which has a less developed levee system than the East Bank where the French Quarter, Business District, SuperDome and Convention Center lie. A private levee has breached in Plaquemines Parish and affected homeowners there but is no threat to New Orleans as it is contained by a separate river levee.

Significant work has been accomplished on East Bank levee and canal improvements. However, the projects on the West Bank are only now under construction. This is important because the track of Gustav differs from Katrina in that it is farther west and thus more endangering to the West Bank. However initial reports are that the West Bank has fared even better than expected.