When the levees broke in August 2005 as a result of Hurricane Katrina, 80 percent of the city of New Orleans was flooded, with a loss of 134,000 homes and 986 lives. The devastation hit the vulnerable communities the hardest: the old, the poor and the African American. The disaster exposed the hideous inequality of the city. In response to the disaster numerous plans, designs and projects were proposed.

Terreform's proposal, A New Algiers, was included in New Orleans Under Reconstruction by Carol M. Reese, Michael Sorkin and Anthony Fontenot. The book is a compendium of various responses from politicians, writers, architects, planners and activists — including Mike Davis, Rebecca Solnit, Naomi Klein, Denise Scott Brown, and M. Christine Boyer.