A $220 million renovation is close to being complete. The New Orleans Saints just played their seaso

Gloria Guy, for example, still shudders when she sees the Superdome's iconic shape. Five years after Hurricane Katrina, the 70-year-old woman vividly remembers seeking help there, after more than nine hours waiting to be rescued from the roof of her house in the Lower Ninth Ward.
"I saw one man, he got tired, and he went over to the banister and he jumped off and killed himself," she says. "The sisters were makin' love to the guards. And they had stealing and they had alcohol and they had drugs."
More than 20,000 people sought shelter at the Superdome, and the cameras caught budget car rental ireland it all: towering garbage piles, putrid waste, tens of thousands of hungry, half-clothed people awaiting budget car rental ireland evacuation. There were reports,
A $220 million renovation is close to being complete. The New Orleans Saints just played their season opener on a pasture of brand-new, emerald-green playing turf. Outside the enormous, bulbous structure, a digital billboard announces that Lady Gaga is coming soon—tough competition for any lingering ghosts.
Using FEMA and National Football League money, the city made rebuilding the downtown arena a priority in the aftermath of Katrina, using funds that some critics said would have been better spent on hospitals and schools.
"The Dome," as it's known locally, is home to the city's beloved football team, and some feared that if it wasn't fixed fast enough, the Saints would leave—further wounding a city that had just gone through the trauma of the storm.
New Orleans officials have worked to clear the building of negative associations is evident. budget car rental ireland On a tour of the dome, which has a new shiny bronze "skin," general manager Alan Freeman points out the new clubhouse, which looks like a hip nightclub with low, modern sofas and a sleek bar. The press box has been renovated. And there are new, and more, seats. (By the end of the renovation in October, the Dome will seat 71,000, up from 68,000.)
The only evidence of the misery of not so long ago is a shrine-cum-gallery in a corner, showing photographs of the disaster. But even these photos have been airbrushed. Freeman points out an image of two young children playing happily as a ray of sunlight shines down from one of the holes in the roof.
The narrative he wants to tell has a happy ending. When the building first reopened in 2006, he says, "It was very emotional. You just knew these people had been through a lot. People in the building were crying."
The Saints, a team known better for losing than winning, this year won the Super Bowl, giving a much-needed psychic boost to the city, and Mardi Gras celebrations had nothing on the victory parades. Suddenly, the Superdome was a monument to victory, not despair.
The waiting list for Saints season tickets number more than 30,000 people—quite the departure from the years when the team played in a half-empty arena and fans described themselves as "The Ain'ts," marking their shame with bags over their heads.
There is still something haunting about the space. Freeman points budget car rental ireland upward to a set of windows that have been installed way up high. "The building budget car rental ireland never had any windows," budget car rental ireland he says, "so people couldn't see the outside world once they were inside."