New Orleans has always been inseparable from the water: the Mississippi River, Lake Pontchartrain and the many nearby lakes, wetlands, rivers and the Gulf of Mexico. In order to protect the metro area from flooding, however, we have long built necessary levees, flood gates and floodwalls. These barriers have only grown more massive and prolific in the last few decades and have had the unfortunate effect of walling off and severing New Orleanians’ connection to the water. The vast majority of people here–including those working in our beloved restaurant industry–do not have access to boats, so this once common bond to the imperiled beauty and bounty of our waterways, bayous and marsh is vanishing.