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Louisiana Geological Survey December 2005
Review of the Engineering Geology ofSt. Bernard Parish, Louisiana
Paul V. Heinrich
i
ntroduction
St. Bernard Parish has a total area o 1,330 square miles (3,445square km). O this area, about 465 square miles (1,200 squarekm) is land. The remaining 865 square miles (2,240 square km), 65percent, o St. Bernard Parish consists o open water in the orm o streams, lakes, and bays. This area lies entirely within the St. Ber-nard delta lobe o the Mississippi delta, which was created by theMississippi River when its main channel occupied Bayou La Loutre(Figure 1)(Frazier, 1967; Wiseman et al., 1979; Saucier, 1994). Theengineering properties o these deltaic sediments, as summarized anddiscussed in this article, provide guidance or the reconstruction o St. Bernard Parish.The elevation o St. Bernard Parish varies rom 6 t (1.8 m) belowsea level to 12 t (3.6 m) above sea level. The portion o St. BernardParish, which lies below sea level, was marsh and swamp, whichhave been drained and protected by dikes. The highest natural partso St. Bernard Parish are the natural levees, locally called “ngerridges”, o the Mississippi River, its distributaries, and a ormerchannel o it now occupied by Bayou La Loutre. The portion o these natural levees lying suciently above sea level that are suit-able or agriculture and urban development without the use o dikes comprise only about 58 square miles (150 square km), o theland within St. Bernard Parish. In the northern part o St. BernardParish, near Arabia, a large man-made pile rises over 35 t (11 m)above sea level.Prior to being devastated by Hurricane Katrina, St. Bernard Parishhad been a prosperous, populated, and culturally distinct part o theNew Orleans metropolitan area. The U.S. Census Bureau estimatedthe population o St. Bernard Parish was 65,554 people in 2004comprising 25,123 households in 2000 (U.S. Census Bureau 2004).This was a population density o about 141 persons per square mile.Given that the vast majority o the population was concentrated ononly 58 square miles o high ground within St. Bernard Parish, theactual population density o its urban areas is several times higherthan this gure. A signicant part o this population comprisedsuburbs containing people who worked within various parts o Orleans Parish. Associated with these suburbs were well-developedwholesale, retail and service business sectors. In 2000, there werean estimated 27,078 housing units and 1,191 private, nonarm busi-nesses within St. Bernard Parish (U.S. Census Bureau, 2004). Notrefected in any o the published statistics was the closely-knit and
05.01 mile
Lake Borgne
M i s
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LEGEND Natural LeveePoint bar under natural leveeDelta plainFill or spoilWater Bayou, ditch,or canalRoadParish boundaryMajor levee
F o r t y A r p e n t C a n a l
For t y Ar pent Canal
L a k e B o r g n e C a n a l
J u d g e P e r e z D r i v e
LA 46
L A 4 6
L A 3 9
L A 3 9
L A 4 6
L A 4 6
S t. Be r na rd Pa ris h
O r lea ns Pa ris h
O r l e a n s P a r i s h
P l a q u e m i n e s P a r i s h
J e f f e r s o n P a r i s h
M i s s i s s i p p i R i v e r
L A 3 9
J u d g e P e r e z D r i v e
M i s s i s s i p p i R i v e r G u l f O u t l e t
Note: artificial leveesalong MississippiRiver and Forty ArpentCanal are not shown.
Figure 1. Surfcial geologic map o the urban corridor within northwest St. Bernard Parish.
December 2005 Louisiana Geological Survey
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oten culturally distinctive nature o many o the numerous com-munities that had developed within St. Bernard Parish since 1780,when it was rst settled.Beore the devastation wrought by Hurricane Katrina, St. BernardParish possessed a diverse industrial base. Along the east bank o the Mississippi River, mostly between Arabia and Chalmette, theindustrial base included sugar (American Sugar and Domino Sugarreneries) and petrochemical (Murphy Oil and Tenneco Oil rener-ies) reneries. Further south, the industrial base consisted mainly o seaood processing plants and some shipbuilding. The populationwithin lowermost part o St. Bernard Parish depended almost entirelyupon shrimping, shing, and oyster arming.The eort by the citizens o St. Bernard Parish to return to whatis their home, rebuild their communities and livelihoods, and remainto lead productive lives will require an understanding o the natureand physical properties o the deltaic sediments that underlie St.Bernard Parish. The physical (engineering) properties o these sedi-ments have been described and summarized in a number o publishedstudies, i.e. Kolb and Van Lopik (1958), Dunbar et al. (1994), Kolb(1962), and Montgomery (1974). Additional geotechnical datais available rom a study, U.S. Army Corps o Engineers (1958),conducted or the construction o the Mississippi River-Gul Outlet(MRGO) channel. These reports, their plates, and 1:62,500 scalegeologic maps are currently available online at U.S. Army Corps o Engineers (2004).A summary o the inormation available rom the above sourcesin relationship to a preliminary geologic map o the urban core o St. Bernard Parish will be presented in this report. This map was pre-pared rom an examination o LIDAR (LIght Detecting And Rang-ing) digital elevation models, soil surveys by Trahan et al. (1989,2000), 1:24,000 scale topographic mapping, and various historicand contemporary aerial imagery. The compilation and analysis o data rom geotechnical investigations produced or various LouisianaDepartment o Transportation and Development, U.S. Army Corpso Engineers, local reneries, and local government projects wouldprovide an even more detailed picture o the engineering geologyo St. Bernard Parish.
n
atural
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eveeS
Within St. Bernard Parish, urban centers and industrial complexesoccupy alluvial ridges, called natural levees, which fank both sideso river and distributary channels (Figure 1). Natural levees areasymmetric ridges, which are highest adjacent to their associatedchannel and slope gently away and downward in elevation rom ituntil they merge with marshes and swamps o lower elevation (Shawand Moresi 1936; Fisk and McFarlan, 1955, 1966).Distributaries are channels that branch o o the modern andrelict courses, i.e. Bayou La Loutre, o the Mississippi River. Theyare called “distributaries” because when active, they distributedfoodwaters away rom the Mississippi River into the surroundingdeltaic plain. The channels o these distributaries and their naturallevees radiate outward in a an-like network rom either the modernMississippi River or its ormer St. Bernard delta lobe trunk channel(Shaw and Moresi 1936; Fisk and McFarlan, 1955, 1966; Kolb andVan Lopik, 1958, 1966; Saucier, 1994).Within St. Bernard Parish, natural levees fank the active channelo the modern Mississippi River and the relict trunk channel andassociated relict distributary channels o the St. Bernard delta lobe.Besides the Mississippi River, the relict trunk channel, now occupiedby Bayou La Loutre, and a large relict distributary channel, now oc-cupied by Bayou Terre Aux Boeus, has large, well-developed naturallevees (Fisk and McFarlan, 1955; Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958, 1966;Saucier, 1994; Shaw and Moresi, 1936).As previously noted, the natural levees constitute the high groundwithin St. Bernard Parish. The highest part o this parish consistso the natural levee o Mississippi River, which orms its east, let-descending, bank. It is as much as 12 t (3.6 m) above sea level. Thetowns o Arabia, Chalmette, Meaux, Poydras, and Violet along withmajor industrial complexes, i.e. the sugar reneries o American Sugarand Domino Sugar and petrochemical reneries o Murphy Oil andTenneco Oil, occupied the natural levee along the east bank o theMississippi River. Chalmette and Poydras occupy segments, whichare wider than normal, where it joins respectively the natural leveeso either an unnamed distributary or Bayou La Loutre (Shaw andMoresi, 1936; Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958, 1966).These natural levees typically consist o equal proportions o highplasticity, at clay, (CH, in the Unied Soil Classication System)and low plasticity, lean clay (CL, in the Unied Soil ClassicationSystem)(gure 2). The natural levees o the Mississippi River andBayou La Loutre also consist o as much as 30 percent silt and sandysilty, which is ML in the Unied Soil Classication System. The siltand sandy silt comprise the crests o these natural levees. Typically,both the grain size and thickness o natural levee sediments decreaseaway rom it crests towards where they merges with the surround-ing delta plain (U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Kolb and VanLopik, 1958; Kolb, 1962).Because o prolonged subaerial exposure, the sediments compris-ing natural levees are typically preconsolidated by desiccation andcementation. As a result, the cohesive clayey sediments ound withinnatural levees typically possess high cohesive shear strength, 800 to1200 lbs per square oot, and low water contents, 20 to 40 percento dry weight. Their Liquid Limits range rom 35 to 75. The watercontents o sandy silt and silt are correspondingly low and typicallyrange rom 20 to 30 percent o dry weight (U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958; Kolb, 1962).Along short segments o the Mississippi River and its abandonedtrunk channel, Bayou La Loutre, lateral migration o the channelcreated narrow, but thick, sequence o point bar sediments (Figure1). These point bar deposits consist o 70 to 110 t (21 to 34 m)thick sequence o sandy sediments, which locally underlie a narrowbelt o natural levee sediments adjacent to their associated channel(Figure 2). Typically, the upper two-thirds to one-hal o the pointbar deposits consists o interstratied mixture o silty clay, silt, andsand (respectively CL, ML, and SP, in the Unied Soil ClassicationSystem). The remaining lower part o the point bar deposits consistso well-sorted (poorly graded) ne sand. Minor amounts o organicmatter, either as ragments o either dritwood or ground up debris,occur within these sediments (U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958;Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958; Kolb, 1962).
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eltaic
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lain
The delta plain o the St. Bernard delta lobe within St. BernardParish consists o low tracts o periodically inundated land that iscovered by a carpet o herbaceous plants. Depending on the degreeo salinity, resh, brackish, or saltwater marsh covers its surace.Adjacent to the natural levees o the major distributaries and majorchannels, cypress-tupelo swamps occupy portions o the delta plain,which are not permanently covered with water. The surace o thedelta plain typically approximates mean high tide level, which is lessthan a oot (0.3 m) higher than mean sea level. Numerous lakes andinterdistributary bays o various sizes and tidal channels break thesurace o the delta plain.
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Louisiana Geological Survey December 2005
The delta plain within St. Bernard Parish is the surace o asequence o deltaic sediments deposited by the Mississippi Riverbetween 1,800 to 4,800 BP as it built out the St. Bernard delta lobe.From bottom to top, this sequence o deltaic sediments consists o (1)prodelta, (2) mixed intradelta and interdistributary, and (3) marshand swamp deposits. Within St. Bernard Parish, the basal prodeltadeposits lie upon a thin layer o shelly marine sands. These sands, inturn, lie upon the oten deeply eroded surace o older Pleistocenesediments, which once was subaerially exposed as the Louisianacontinental shel. The total thickness o deltaic deposits within St.Bernard Parish ranges rom less than 50 (15m) to over 150 t (46 m)in thickness (Fisk and McFarlan, 1955; Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958;U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Frazier, 1967).
p
rodelta
d
epoSitS
The lowermost layer o deltaic sediments o the St. Bernard deltalobe consists o a gulward thickening blanket o clay (Figure 2).This layer accumulated within the Gul o Mexico as clay carried bycurrents out o the delta mouth and into the Gul o Mexico settledrom suspension on its bottom. Visually, these clays appear massivealthough they show laminations when x-rayed (Kolb and Van Lopik,1958; U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Coleman, 1981).These prodelta sediments consist o homogeneous, normallyconsolidated at clay (CH). These sediments decrease in grain sizewith depth rom silty clay to ne clay. Their water content typicallyranges rom 40 to 80 percent o dry weight. Their Liquid Limit rangesrom 70 to 120 and their Plasticity Index ranges rom 30 to 35. Thecohesive strength o the prodelta sediments gradually increases withdepth typically within the range o 200 to 600 lbs per square eet.In deeper borings, the cohesive strength o these sediments has beenound to be as high as 900 to 1300 lbs per square eet (Kolb and VanLopik, 1958; U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958).
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ntradelta
and
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nterdiStributary
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epoSitS
The sediments underlying and composing the bulk o the deltaplain within St. Bernard Parish consist o a mixture o interngeringand interlayered intradelta and interdistributary sediments overlyingthe prodelta sediments (gure 2). The intradelta deposits consist o silts and clayey silts deposited as a mixture o the delta ront andas crevasse splays and sandy sediments deposited as distributarymouth bars. The interdistributary deposits consist o laminated clay,typically with silt laminae or partings, which accumulated withininterdistributary bays rom the settling o ne-grained sedimentsbrought into them by foodwaters (Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958; U.S.Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Coleman, 1981).Intradelta deposits typically consist o a heterogeneous mixture o normally consolidated silt and clayey silt (ML), silty clay (CL), atclay (CH), and about one-ourth ne-grained well-sorted (poorly-graded) sand (SP). The water content ranges rom 30 to 40 percento dry weight or the at clay and 15 to 30 percent or the silt andclayey silt. The Liquid Limit o the clays range rom 35 to 110 ando the silt and clayey silt is as much as to 30. The Plasticity Index o the clays ranges rom 15 to 60 and or the silt and clayey silt it is asmuch as 10. These sediments have a moderate cohesive strength (Kolband Van Lopik, 1958; U.S. Army Corps o Engineers, 1958).Interdistributary deposits consist largely o underconsolidatedat clay (CH). Its water content typically ranges rom 50 to 160percent o dry weight. Its Liquid Limit ranges rom 60 to 160 andtheir Plasticity Index ranges rom 30 to 75. The cohesive strengtho the at clay erratically increases with depth and generally rangesrom o 150 to 300 lbs per square eet with an observed maximumaround 500 lbs per square eet (Kolb and Van Lopik, 1958; U.S.Army Corps o Engineers, 1958; Coleman, 1981).
Figure 2. Cross Section o natural levees and delta plain within the urbanized part o St. Bernard Parish. (Reprinted rom Dunbar et al. 1994)
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Engineering Geology of St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana
Reprint of short article about the engineering geology of St. Bernard Parish, Mississippi River Delta, Louisiana for post-Katrina rebuilding efforts. The article is:
Heinrich, P. V., 2005, Review of the Engineering
Geology of St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana. Louisiana
Geological Survey NewsInsights. vol. 15, no. 3,
pp. 6-11.
Heinrich, P. V., 2005, Review of the Engineering
Geology of St. Bernard Parish, Louisiana. Louisiana
Geological Survey NewsInsights. vol. 15, no. 3,
pp. 6-11.
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