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The Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway is a flood control component of the Mississippi River and Tributaries Project located on the west bank of the Mississippi River in southeast Missouri just below the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers. The construction of the floodway was authorized by the Flood Control Act of 1928 and later modified by the Flood Control Act of 1965. Its purpose is to divert water from the Mississippi River during major flood events and lower the flood stages upstream, notably at Cairo, Illinois. The floodway has been the focus of legal opposition by residents and landowners since its inception. ==History== After the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927, the engineering policy on the Mississippi River changed from building levees high enough to withstand the greatest recorded flood to include floodways. The Flood Control Act of 1928 authorized the United States Army Corps of Engineers to construct the Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway in Missouri and the Morganza Spillway and Bonnet Carre Spillway in Louisiana. Even before its authorization, the Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway was the subject of controversy.〔 In June 1927, President Calvin Coolidge instructed the Mississippi River Commission and the Corps of Engineers to develop a plan to protect the Mississippi alluvial valley from future floods. The Commission recommended four floodways below the mouth of the Arkansas River and, above, stronger and higher levees set back from the channel. Chief of Engineers Maj. Gen. Edgar Jadwin rejected the costly plan and submitted one of his own. Jadwin's plan included the Birds Point-New Madrid floodway with a setback levee between and miles from the existing mainline levee. Eleven miles of the mainline levee were to be lowered by to create a fuse plug levee. At a flood stage of on the Cairo gage, the levee would overtop and creavasse to divert water to the floodway. The Flood Control Act of 1928 adopted the Jadwin plan for the Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway and included a provision for compensation of landowners within the floodway. President Coolidge authorized a one-time indemnity paid to landowners to flood their land and the purchase of the land adjacent to the upper fuseplug of the frontline levee. The authorization stipulated that the fuseplug was not to be constructed until at least half of the flowage rights had been secured. Construction was scheduled to begin in the summer of 1929, but landowner George W. Kirk filed a lawsuit maintaining that he would be unable to sell his land or secure loans as a result of the floodway. Judge Charles B. Davis of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri ruled in favor of the government and denied an injunction. Construction of the setback levvee started in October 1929 and was completed in October 1932. Acquisition of the required flowage rights was not accomplished until January 1942. The Watershed Protection and Flood Prevention Act of 1954 authorized the construction of a new levee to project grade extending across the gap at the lower end of the frontline levee. However, the inability of the St. John Levee and Drainage District to obtain the necessary easements has prevented the Corps of Engineers from initiating the project. The Flood Control Act of 1965 authorized the increase of the frontline levee to on the Cairo gage and the fuseplug sections to . The MIssissippi River Commission further modified the plan to raise the fuseplug sections to , the frontline levee to , and the mainline levee to on the Cairo gage.The plan called for the use of explosives on the upper fuseplug section if the River reached at Cairo and was forecast to exceed After the floods of 1973, 1975, and 1979, the Mississippi River Commission again revised its plan to include four artificial crevasses: two at the upper fuseplug, one at the lower fuseplug, and one on the frontline levee opposite Hickman, Kentucky. The use of explosives was expanded to all four fuseplugs. The Mississippi River Commission and the Corps of Engineers later realized that they did not have sufficient property rights to access the levee to place and detonate explosives. In 1981, the MIssissippi River Commission Memphis District commander requested entry permission from the St. John Levee and Drainage District and Levee District No. 3 of Mississippi County, Missouri, but the request was refused. Following the 1983 flood, a section of the upper fuseplug and section of the lower fuseplug were raised and embedded with sections of polyethylene pipe to be filled with liquid explosives and detonated when the Cairo flood stage reached . A 1990 Corps of Engineers study of alternatives to the floodway recommended a number of improvements in the floodway, but these were not authorized by Congress. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Birds Point-New Madrid Floodway」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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