Site

New Orleans is located 330 miles east of Houston, 600 miles south of St. Louis and 900 miles west-west of Miami. It covers an area of 907 km², of which 48.45% are in bodies of water. The city follows a meander of the Mississippi, hence its nickname The Crescent City. The city is enclosed between Lake Pontchartrain to the north, the Mississippi that crosses the city to the south, Jefferson parish to the southwest, and Plaquemine parish to the southeast. Most of its territory is located below sea level (about 60 cm). Some areas already 5 m below sea level continue to sink by an average of 6 mm and up to 2.5 cm per year in some areas. With dams and dykes built to control the Mississippi floods and facilitate river traffic, the delta has been deprived of sediment and alluvial deposits, the wetlands that protected the city from the raging water are now under the waves.

Climate

According to the Köppen classification: the temperature of the coldest month is between 0°C and 18°C (January with 11.7°C) and the temperature of the hottest month is above 10°C (July and August with 28.2°C) so it is a temperate climate. Rainfall is stable and abundant, there is no dry season. So it's a warm temperate climate without a dry season. The summer is hot because the average temperature of the warmest month is above 22°C (July and August at 28.2°C).

The climate of New Orleans is therefore classified as Cfa in the Köppen classification, i.e. it is a humid subtropical climate.

Winters are cool (16 to 25 °C on average during the day). Spring is one of the best times to visit the city for its good temperatures and still moderate humidity. In summer, the temperatures are very high (35 °C), the mornings and early afternoons are sunny and stormy periods are often felt at the end of the day. The humidity of the climate is particularly strong in summer, at the end of which the city can be hit by hurricanes coming from the Gulf of Mexico. Autumn remains hot.

Throughout its history, the city has been devastated twenty-seven times by hurricanes or floods, about once every eleven years.

Colonial period

In 1691, French explorers surveyed the Mississippi River Delta region. The runners of the French and Canadian woods and trappers traveled the territory and traded the fur with the Amerindians. In 1701, a first counter in the late ^17th century was transformed into a fortified trading post called Fort Saint-Jean at the confluence of the Saint-Jean bayou and Pontchartrain Lake just north of the future city of New Orleans.

View of New Orleans in 1720.

The town was founded by the French under the direction of the colonist Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville in 1718. The name of the city was chosen in honor of the regent, Philippe, Duke of Orléans. At the start of the Mississippi Company, it became the capital of French Louisiana in 1722 (the capital was transferred from Biloxi to New Orleans).

The site chosen is that of a meander of the Mississippi, hence the crescent shape of the city which gives it the nickname of Crescent City, the crescent-shaped city. Fortifications had to surround it from the beginning, but they were never realized. It was not until 1760 that a wooden fence was built in an emergency.

The plans for New Orleans were drawn by Adrien de Pauger and Le Blond de la Tour on the traditional model of the new cities, that is, a symmetrical checkerboard, whose maximum size was to be 88 hectares divided into 66 islets, with a square where the church (the future cathedral of St. Louis), the house of the governor and the castles were located. herns. On the docks were built shops, a hospital and the convent of the Ursulines. It was especially Adrien de Pauger who drew the maps of the Old Square with its right-angle streets. Construction was very difficult because of the climate but also because of the dense forests that occupied the site: the 1722 hurricane caused enormous damage. Lack of labor, epidemics, and mosquitoes also slowed down the work. The channel began digging in 1723. The dyke along the Mississippi was completed in 1724.

New Orleans in 1728.

Plan of New Orleans in 1763.

The old French square, or French quarter.

St. Louis Cathedral seen from Jackson square (formerly Place D'armes).

The fact that Louisiana lacked rigid social, political and religious structures gave everyone a sense of increased freedom. According to the parish registers of the time, half of the Catholics of New Orleans did not make their easter and only rarely entered the church of St. Louis. The attendance of Native Americans with freer mores, especially in sexual matters, had to contribute to the evolution of mentalities. But especially the lack of women was a major problem. The kingdom of France sent women's contingents to New France, and in particular to French Louisiana. Daughters of the king were sent as early as the end of the seventeenth century. In the eighteenth century came the Daughters of the cassette, equipped with a trousseau supplied on the moneys of the royal cassette. Within a few years, more than 1,300 women arrived from France, including 160 prostitutes^{[ref. necessary]}. Cases of bigamy were not rare and many French settlers took young Amerindians, especially young black women, as mistresses, and placed them in their property through the system of planting, since the Black Code prevented interracial marriage. In short, the city of New Orleans was home to a cosmopolitan, multiracial, and, in some ways, interlope community.

In 1733, when Jean-Baptiste Le Moyne de Bienville became governor of Louisiana, New Orleans already had the reputation of a free and joyous city, with its festivals, good tables and dances. Throughout this period, French remained the official language of the colony: it was the only white language, but the blacks spoke Creole (based on French) and the Amerindians, their own languages.

New Orleans became the economic capital of Louisiana. It exported skin from the interior as well as products from the plantations (indigo, tobacco...).

In 1762, the colony was ceded to the Spanish Empire by a secret agreement: the Treaty of Fontainebleau, which was confirmed by the Treaty of Paris, but no Spanish governor (Antonio de Ulloa) came to take control of the city before 1766. Similarly, few Spanish speakers came to settle in the Louisiana capital. Some of the first French settlers were never satisfied with the Spanish regime and made numerous petitions to return to France. On October 28, 1768, a group of Creole settlers tried to drive the Spaniards out of the city following the establishment of the exclusive. The takeover was carried out by a troop sent in July 1769. The leaders were arrested and nine of them were sentenced to death. A municipal council was set up to satisfy local demands.

A fire destroyed 856 buildings in New Orleans on March 21, 1788 and another 212 in December 1794. As a result, a planning regulation imposed brick as a substitute for wood for the houses on each floor, and tiles for the blankets.

The city's population was limited to 4,985 inhabitants in 1785, with a total of 32,000 inhabitants for all Louisiana, then Spanish and encompassing the western part of Florida, in particular the Biloxi area. In 1785, the Count of Aranda to populate Louisiana against the Anglo-Saxons, suggested to King Charles III of Spain that he obtain from King Louis XVI the possibility of establishing the last Acadians who remained unassimilated in France. Transactions with Charles Gravier de Vergennes culminated in April 1784: transport costs are paid by Spain, France settles its arrears of pensions to the Acadians. Seven ships were armed and departed from Nantes in 1785 towards New Orleans. Because of the deaths during the journey, births and illegal immigrants, we can ^{[Who?] advance the figures of 1,596 Acadians who are transported in this way, on} Bon Papa and le Saint-Rémy armed by Jean Peltier Dudoyer, the Bergère armed by Joseph Monesron Dupin, Caroline, commanded by Nicolas Baudin, the Beaufort Mount, the Friendship and the Town of Arcangel.

In 1791, the new governor of Louisiana, Francisco Luis Hector de Carondelet, initiated a cultural policy while developing the improvement and comfort of Louisians, such as the installation of street lighting. A theater was built on Saint-Pierre Street, the Théâtre de la Rue Saint-Pierre, which was a wooden building of the country located in downtown New Orleans, located in the Old French Square district. The director of the theater was a refugee from Santo Domingo, Jean Baptiste Le Sueur Fontaine. He played French actors such as Jeanne-Marie Marsan.

In 1795, Spain authorized the United States to use the port. The city returned to French control in 1800 but in 1803 Napoleon Bonaparte sold Louisiana (which included a much larger territory including the Pays des Illinois, New France and Louisiana) to the United States for 80 million francs. At that time, the city had about eight thousand inhabitants. That same year, the city's first mayor, Étienne de Boré, appointed by Governor William C. C. Claiborne, established a police force under the direction of Pierre Achille Rivery, headed by twenty-five men.

The population suffered from epidemics of yellow fever, malaria and smallpox, eradicated after 1905. 22 large-scale outbreaks of yellow fever between, which have claimed more than 150,000 lives in total in the city and as many in the region are recorded between the purchase of Louisiana and the Civil War.

The Old Square (French Quarter) of New Orleans, Louisiana.

^Nineteenth century

View of New Orleans in 1803.

Louisiana became one of the States of the United States in 1803. New Orleans, in 1805, had a total population of 8,475. From 1806 until December 1809 a total of 9,059 French refugees from Santo Domingo in America, including 2,731 white, 3,102 free blacks and 3,326 slaves, more than doubling its population. In 1810, the city had 24,552 inhabitants, of which only 3,200 were English-speaking.

Historians have found their mark thanks to the abundant French press: among them Le Moniteur de la Louisiane, the first newspaper published in Louisiana in 1794 by Louis Duclot and under the editor-in-chief of Jean Baptiste Le Sueur Fontaine, two of the French refugees from Santo Domingo in America, or L'Ami des Lois (created in 1809 by Jean-Théophile Leclerhile c the French revolutionary) and The Bee of New Orleans (1825).

The population of the city more than doubled with the arrival of French Creoles who left Santo Domingo at the end of the colony in 1802 and 1803, and then, in a second wave in 1809, by those who were expelled by the Spaniards of the island of Cuba where many had taken refuge around Santiago; some will grow cotton in the four southern states of the United States, which will account for 80% of the cotton crop in 1860 (Louisiana, Alabama, Mississippi and Georgia). During the Anglo-American War of 1812 the British sent a force to try to conquer the city, but they were defeated by troops commanded by Andrew Jackson a few kilometers downstream at Chalmette on 8 January 1815 (Battle of New Orleans).

The city's population doubled in the 1830s. By 1840, it had even reached 100,000 inhabitants, making it the fourth largest city in the United States. According to Brasseaux, nearly fifty thousand French entered the United States through New Orleans between 1820 and 1860, while the other port, Baton Rouge, provided for the transport of slaves from the East Coast. Now he had to be kept: in 1808, trafficking was prohibited.

The city was the capital of the state of Louisiana until 1849, then from 1865 to 1880. On that date, Baton Rouge took over. Its port played a major role in the slave trade, while it had the largest bonded community of origin.

The story of Delphine Lalaurie is probably the most well known of the macabre miscellaneous facts of the Old French Square. Madame Lalaurie, a respected fashion designer, hosted many major events in her opulent home, 1140 Rue Royale. His lavish lifestyle was served by a large number of slaves. However, since slave abuse was illegal, society began to avoid LaLaurie after a neighbor caught this elegant woman hunting a slave girl with a whip. The girl jumped from the roof in a desperate effort to flee LaLaurie and killed herself. The neighbor warns the authorities. It was the end of Lalaurie's social career, rejected by the right society.

During the Civil War, New Orleans was taken by the Union (the Northerners) without combat on 1^st May 1862. As urban guardians, the militias of European citizens, and mainly French citizens, prevent the destruction of the city desired by rioters.

In 1866, a black political rally was attacked by the police and former Confederate soldiers: 34 Blacks and 3 White Republicans are shot or beaten to death. The army finally intervenes and arrests 261 blacks but no attackers.

It remains a historical style with the richness of the ^19th century beyond the Old French square. The city hosted the Universal Exhibition of the Centennial of Cotton.

The city gained a reputation of debauchery and tripod in the late ^19th century and early ^20th century, notably with the seemingly quiet Storyville neighborhood.

In March 1891, eleven Italians were lynched by several thousand people. The massacre had serious diplomatic repercussions. Italy suspended diplomatic relations with the United States after President Benjamin Harrison refused to open a federal investigation. The press and public rumor propagated the idea that the Italian navy was about to attack American ports and thousands of volunteers came to war with Italy.

^20th century

Canal Street.

New Orleans (center, satellite view) follows a meander of the Mississippi River (south), hence its nickname The Crescent City (the growing city). Lake Pontchartrain is to the north.

Aerial photo of downtown (right of river). The white circle is the Superdome.

Much of the city is located below sea level. It is bordered by the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain. Finally, the city is comforted and surrounded by dykes. Until the early ^20th century, construction was largely limited to the slightly raised part of natural dykes and bayous, as the rest of the region was made up of swamps subject to frequent flooding. This gave the city, in the ^19th century, the shape of a crescent. In the 1910s, engineer A. Baldwin Wood proposed an ambitious drainage plan with pumps of his design that are still used today.

In the 1920s, in an effort to modernize the appearance of the city, many guardrails on the balconies of the Rue du Canal, the shopping street, were removed. In the 1960s, streetcars were replaced by buses. These decisions were then considered errors and now the street has returned to its original aspect, which is pleasing to tourists looking for a change of scenery.

^twenty-first century

Following Hurricane Katrina's passage on August 29, 2005, its population was largely evacuated to cities in Louisiana, Texas, and other states of the US federation. Currently, the city is being gradually rebuilt, but some of the evacuees have never returned, New Orleans has in fact lost 30% of its population.

On 30 and 31 August 2008, the city was evacuated again, following the announcement of the approaching hurricane Gustav, which finally bypassed the city the next day.

Demographics

Population evolution

After the founding of the city in 1718, the colonization of Louisiana did not make a recipe, and the kingdom the people by mixing with it the convicts, "daughters of the cassette" endowed by the Regency and "women of bad life", including the Amiénoise Marie-Anne Lescau who inspired the character of Manon Lescaut. Although John Law had 7,000 people sent to Louisiana (1,500 of them by force) between 1717 and 1720, New Orleans itself would have counted only:

• 203 inhabitants in 1723;
• 893 inhabitants in 1726, including 626 white and 267 slaves;
• 1,750 inhabitants (excluding the military) in 1735, of which 799 were white, 925 were black slaves and 26 were Native American slaves.

Many soldiers at the end of the engagements settled in the colony, especially since many had taken an Amerindian wife or mistress. They were 1,500 between 1731 and 1756, including 1,000 for New Orleans.

From 1755, many Acadians (4,000?), driven from Acadia by the Great Disorder, settled in Louisiana, especially Acadian, but also in New Orleans, leading to an increase in its population. Cadians or Cajuns, they will be for many in the perpetuation of the French language and culture in Louisiana.

In 1803, when Louisiana was sold, the city had between 12,000 and 15,000 inhabitants.

In 1812, the population increased considerably, reaching 25,000 inhabitants due to the massive arrival of French and Creoles fleeing the island of Santo Domingo (the former colony of Santo Domingo which became the republic of Haiti).

In 1860, during the Civil War, New Orleans was the sixth largest city in the United States. With 169,000 inhabitants, it was the only city in the South with more than 100,000 inhabitants.

Distribution of ethnic groups in 2010. Each dot represents 25 people: Non-Hispanic whites, blacks, Asians, Latinos and others (yellow).

Sociology

Population composition per cent (2010)

Group	New Orleans	Louisiana	United States
African-Americans	60.2	32.0	12.6
White	33.0	62.6	72.4
Asian	2.9	1.6	4.8
Others	1.9	1.6	6.4
Métis	1.7	1.6	2.9
Amerindians	0.3	0.7	0.9
Total	100	100	100
Latin Americans	5.3	4.2	16.7

New Orleans is one of the wealthiest cities in the United States^{[ref. necessary]}. It has one of the country's largest black populations (60% of the city's inhabitants).

According to the American Community Survey, for the period 2011-2015, 27.0% of the population lives below the poverty line (15.5% at the national level). This rate masks significant inequalities, as it is 35.0% for African-Americans and 12.2% for non-Hispanic whites. In addition, 41.0 per cent of people under the age of 18 live below the poverty line, while 24.5 per cent of those aged 18-64 and 16.2 per cent of those over 65 live below the poverty line.

When the national crime rate decreased, homicide rates increased significantly in New Orleans. For example, a person living in New Orleans is ten times more likely to be murdered than the average American. The homicide rate is higher than in other larger cities such as New York, Los Angeles or Chicago^{[ref. necessary]}.

Like many other US cities, New Orleans is facing the collapse of its pension system. The pensions of his ex-civil servants are not always paid now.

Languages

According to the American Community Survey (en) , for the period 2011-2015, 90.89% of the population over the age of 5 reported speaking English at home, 4.33% said speaking Spanish, 1.78% Vietnamese, 1.12% French, 0.31% Chinese language, and 1.55% another language.

Francophonie

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Map of municipalities and linguistic areas of New Orleans in 1863.

Bilingual road sign at the entrance to Louisiana.

When Louisiana was sold by Napoleon I to the United States in 1803, Louisiana was essentially populated by settlers of French origin, composed of Franco-Louisiana, Acadians, French Canadians, Creoles de Louisiana and slaves. The port of New Orleans, which became the state of Louisiana, was to receive a large and continuous flow of immigrants until the Civil War. The first to settle between 1804 and 1810 were several thousand French from the colony of Santo Domingo fleeing with their slaves the Haitian revolution. Then came four continuous flows of immigrants from the rest of the US, France, Ireland, Italy, and Germany.

On his trip to America, Alexis de Tocqueville stayed in New Orleans in 1832 and met the attorney general of Louisiana, Étienne Mazureau, who provided him with numerous sociological, demographic and linguistic data on Louisiana, including New Orleans. The port city is then divided into three municipalities; two are french and one is english.

• The first municipality is composed of the historic Old French Square and the districts of Tremé, Fontainebleau, Audubon and Bayou Saint-Jean. It is a French-speaking municipality populated since the colonization of French Louisiana.
• The second municipality is located upstream of the Mississippi River. It is adjacent to the first and welcomes English-speaking American immigrants from the rest of the United States. Mainly Protestant, the municipality will receive many Irish Catholics, notably with the establishment of Catholic religious offices in English.
• The third municipality is located downstream of the Mississippi River. It is adjacent to the first municipality. It is composed of the Faubourg Marigny. It is originally populated by French Creole, mulatto and French-African metis. It was the historical site of the place, a system inherited from the French period, but in disuse, which consisted in placing black slave women for the white masters as concubines. The mixed children from these hundreds of couples became free men of color. The third municipality subsequently hosted several thousand immigrants from France during the ^19th century.

The Creoles, métis, mulatto and black slaves remained faithful to the French language, in particular because of the revolutionary ideals of equality and freedom of the French Revolution. After the ravages and upheavals of the Civil War due to the defeat of the Confederates, Louisiana's linguistic landscape changed. Francophones are no longer the majority and become part of American society. Even if French continues to be spoken at home, the majority of schools now offer only English as a language of instruction. As for the Creoles, mulatto, metis and former French slaves, they cannot constitute French schools because of their poverty. The French language regressed until the First World War and was officially banned in 1921.

It was not until 1968 that the French language was officially reborn in Louisiana. The Council for the Development of French in Louisiana (Codofil), led by James Domengeaux, will fight to impose the French language as an official language of the state of Louisiana. French has never completely disappeared, especially from New Orleans. The elders still speak it, and their grandchildren start to take an interest in their former French origins. A revival of French learning is emerging. The International Organization of the Francophonie is participating in this enthusiasm by sending hundreds of French, Belgian, Canadian, Swiss, Maghreb and even Vietnamese teachers to train students and their future teachers.

Of the one million inhabitants of the town in 1970, only 10% (or 100,000 people) had French as their mother tongue. Among them, a minority (about 40,000 people) came from old urban Creole families in the Old Square; Even less (10,500) of the black Francophone community (from which Sidney Bechet originated), and the rest (50,000 people) were Canadians who left their bayous or the Lafayette prairie. All of these categories were affected by the intensive English acculturation introduced by widespread schooling in the interwar period. It concerns in particular the half-million Francophones counted in 1970 (including still some Amerindians Koasati, Houma and Chitimachas) on the million Franco-Louisiana or "French of Louisiana", as the common American expression Louisiana French.

General data

The business center of New Orleans, seen from the Mississippi.

Oil refinery near New Orleans, Mississippi.

New Orleans' economy has been in decline for generations. New Orleans has long been a major international port that benefited from its privileged location at the outlet of the Great Plains: the port exported grain (12.5 million tons in 1996). It also lived through a vast hinterland irrigated by the 23,000 km of the Mississippi River System and its tributaries. It was the world's leading ship carrier.

In the ^19th century, New Orleans was the site of a US Mint hotel. Today, its building is a Louisiana State Museum.

In the ^twentieth century, under Governor Huey Long's authoritarian rule, Louisiana expanded its port facilities and oil-related industry, giving many people the opportunity to join the working or middle class. The Avondale shipyard is Louisiana's main industrial site in terms of jobs.

But then, the development of the productive economy or sectors such as energy or trade, offering high wages, were abandoned in favor of the arts, culture and, above all, tourism.

Tourism has thus become New Orleans' main activity. But it is a low-wage activity, often 50% below the national average, allowing nearly half of the mostly black employees to keep their families above the poverty line. With culture, it is an industry that has benefited the white part of the population^{[ref. necessary]}, owners of restaurants, hotels, agents and real estate developers.

Port

Two cruise ships of the Sté Carnival docked in New Orleans requisitioned after the passage of Katrina.

The port of New Orleans is the fifth port of the United States in terms of volume of goods, in terms of value of goods transported, the port of New Orleans is in the twelfth position. It also has the largest dock length with 3.1 kilometers long and can accommodate 13 ships at the same time.

This port facility processes an equivalent volume of 84 million tons of cargo per year. The southern Louisiana port, located between New Orleans and Baton Rouge, handles 199 million tons of cargo. The two being combined form the largest port in the world, in large tonnage and the fourth in annual volume processed.

New Orleans is one of the world's leading ports for the transshipment of steel, rubber and coffee. It accommodates more than 6,000 boats per year and 700,000 passengers in transit to the Caribbean, Mexico and the Bahamas.

New Orleans Port exports are mainly concentrated in southern U.S. production: grains and petroleum products.

The port has "Erato street", "Julia street 1" and "Julia street 2" terminals, so there are nearly 700,000 passengers from various companies, such as: Carnival Cruise Lines, Royal Caribbean Cruise Line, Norwegian Cruise Line and ACCL.

Cultural heritage

Scene from the New Orleans Carnival.

The city is at the heart of the Caribbean culture, including voodoo. Many visitors embrace the Canadian slogan "Let the good times drive", notably by strolling through the Old French Square which is surrounded by the river and the streets of the Rempart, Canal and Esplanade. One of the local specialties to be tasted at the Café du Monde (near the French Market): coffee with milk and doughnuts. The Natchez, a wheeled boat, takes a daily tour of the Mississippi River.

Now two streetcars (a sort of tramway) with the red line parallel to the Canal Street through the Old French Square and the green line along Saint-Charles Street serve the citizens of New Orleans. A nostalgic walk forever immortalized in the famous room of Tennessee Williams A tram called Désir.

Because of the height of the water table, cemeteries use cryptography. For a long time, funeral ceremonies have been accompanied by jazz musicians (funeral jazz). No visit to New Orleans is complete without an excursion to the city's oldest outdoor museums, its historic cemeteries (Saint-Louis cemetery). Often called the "Cities of the Dead", these cemeteries are remarkable for their unique and surface tombs. The said tombs are monuments of the eighteenth, nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and are, like the cemeteries themselves, a remarkable part of the French heritage so particular of this city.

Gastronomy

Among the many culinary specialties: Neo-orlean fritters, red beans with rice, po' boy and muffuletta (sandwiches); the gulf oysters and the crawfish (small freshwater crayfish); choking, jambalaya, gumbo, sazerac and Creole cuisine.

• New Orleans prides itself on being the city that has the best cuisine in the United States and the best music in the world. Indeed, this is the city from which jazz and blues come, and you can eat Canadian or Creole food;
• The town has about 120 jazz clubs in 2006.

Education

• Tulane University, a private, prestigious and highly selective institution;
• Loyola University, a private institution;
• University of New Orleans, a public institution managed by the state of Louisiana as part of the state university of Louisiana.

Museums

• Voodoo Museum
  • New Orleans Museum of Arts (NOMA) 1, Collins Diboll Circle( City Park)
• New Orleans Historic Voodoo Museum, 724 Dumaine St./Bourbon St.
• New Orleans Pharmacy Museum, 514 Charles St. /Toulouse St.
• Civil War Museum, 929 Camp St./Saint Joseph St.
• Ogden Museum of Southern Art, 925 Camp St./ Saint Joseph St.
• Contemporary Art Center, 900 Camp St./St. Joseph St.
• Tuesday Gras World, 1380 Port of New Orleans place.
• Mc Kenna Museum of American Art, 2003 Carondelet St./Saint Andrew St.
• Musee Rosette Rochon, 1515 Panger St./Dauphine St.
• National War II Museum, 945 Magazine St.  
• New Orleans Jazz Museum, 400 Ave esplanade.
• Historic New Orleans Collection, 533 Royal St./Toulouse St.
• The Presbytere (Tuesday Gras/ Hurricane Katrina), 751 Charles St./Saint Anne St.
• .The Cabildo, 701 Charles St./Saint Peter St.

New Orleans has 24 skyscrapers, the tallest of which is the Hancock Whitney Center, which is 221 meters high.

Hancock Whitney Center.

In the religious realm, the city includes New Orleans' St. Louis Cathedral, which is the oldest continuously operating cathedral in the United States.

In the ^19th century, St. Patrick's Church in New Orleans was built.

Public transport

New Orleans Tram.

A fairly dense transportation system managed by the Regional Transit Authority (RTA) covers the New Orleans metropolitan area. Twenty-eight bus lines run through New Orleans (including the Algier, Garden District, Mid-City, New Orleans East and the French Quarter), the eastern part of the independent municipality of Metairie (west of the city) and the city of Gretna (on the south bank of the Mississippi).

Three tram lines (streetcar) run through the districts of Mid-City, Garden District, and the Old French Quarter.

Trains

New Orleans has an Amtrak station: the New Orleans Union Passenger Terminal. The city is connected directly to Chicago. The "Crescent" line connects New York and New Orleans, serving two other cities: Washington D.C. and Atlanta. The "Sunset Limited" line connects Los Angeles and New Orleans.

Airport

The city is served by New Orleans' Louis Armstrong International Airport, located in Kenner, twenty minutes from downtown New Orleans. The airport has a single main terminal with four satellites, which makes traffic very easy. Shuttles provide a public transportation service between the airport and the Central Business District areas where the hotels are located.

It is the 51^th North American airport with more than 7.7 million passengers in transit in 2009. In 2001, he took the name of Louis Armstrong in tribute to the famous New Orlean jazzman.

The city is run by a mayor and a council of seven members, all elected for four years.

• New Orleans is the city that hosts the most festivals in the world: every year, nearly 500 different events take place in different neighborhoods.
• The most famous carnival is that of Mardi gras, with parades and floating decorations, which brings together nearly 700,000 people in February 2007.
• The Jazz Festival (called New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival or "Jazz Fest"), organized since 1969, gathered more than 400,000 people in April-May 2006.

See Krewe du Vieux (en) , New Orleans Fat Tuesday and Indian Fat Tuesday.

Professional clubs:

• American football - Saints of New Orleans NFL;
• Basketball - Players of New Orleans, NBA (Jazz 1974-1979; Hornets 2002-2005 and 2008-2013);
• Baseball - Baby Cakes from New Orleans, Minor League of Baseball.

The biggest sports infrastructure in the city is the Superdome.

Literature

• Manon Lescaut of Abbé Prévost (1731). The last episode takes place in this city, which the author calls the New Orleans.
• The series Dave Robicheaux, novels by James Lee Burke.
• Walker Percy's novel The Cinephalus.
• John Kennedy Toole's novel The Conjuration of Imbeciles.
• Dinner at Antoine's, Frances Parkinson Keyes police novel.
• Interview with a vampire, novel by Anne Rice, adapted to the cinema by Neil Jordan and more generally his Vampire Chronicles as well as the cycle The witch saga.
• The Awakening, novel by Kate Chopin.
• Lost souls and The Exquisite Body, novels by Poppy Z. Brite.
• The Saga of the Landry Family, a novel by Virginia C. Andrews.
• The Circle of Immortals, series by Sherrilyn Kenyon.
• The secret of Bayou, Nora Roberts' novel.
• Bayou, novel by Pamela Jekel.
• Esplanade Avenue, novel by Annick Le Scoëzec Masson, Paris, 2010.
• Hurricane, Laurent Gaudé, Acts Sud, 2010.
• Big Easy, Ruta Sepetys (American) youth novel, 2013.
• The Originals, series by Julie Plec.

Cinema

Television

Video Games

• Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New Orleans
• Saint Louis Cathedral of New Orleans
• List of locations in Louisiana

This section does not adequately cite its sources (April 2019). 

To improve it, add verifiable references [how to do?] or the template {{Reference necessary}} on passages requiring a source.

New Orleans is paired with fourteen cities:

•  Belém (Brazil);
•  Caracas (Venezuela);
•  Combourg (France);
•  Glenelg (Australia);
•  Innsbruck (Austria);
•  Juan-les-Pins (France);
•  Maracaibo (Venezuela);
•  Matsue (Japan);
•  Mérida (Mexico);
•  Pointe-Noire (Congo);
•  San Miguel de Tucumán (Argentina);
•  Tegucigalpa (Honduras);
•  Isola del Liri (Italy);
•  Orleans (France) since 2018.