[Digory]

I understand that resources are limited. In my city, you'd just evacuate certain areas, rather than the whole metro area, but I'll assume Houston made its decision in good faith based on data. Hopefully, the death toll stays low.

If I were a citizen, though, I would have liked to know last week or month that Houston is too big to evacuate. No matter how bad it gets, that call won't come, apparently. We're used to evac orders in dangerous storms, and calibrate our plans accordingly. I want a government that admits "its on you," rather than knowing the government will choose to misinform me when it hits the fan. I am seeing people with a day or two of medicine, not a week or month, etc. A warning that no warning will come might have made a difference there.

[stephenhuey]

I was here in town for both Rita (the storm that "didn't happen" that put 3 million people on the road at once) and also Ike. Lots of rescues have been needed but that number is tiny compared to the population of Houston. Your suggestion to evacuate certain areas doesn't work here--there'd be far too many areas. Houstonians are generally knowledgable about staying safe in a storm such as this, and evacuations have often led to avoidable deaths and other problems in the past. I've been sitting in the middle of the city for days and I'm with the local officials on this one, not the governor.