The Gulf Intracoastal Waterway West Closure Complex is a part of the New Orleans Drainage System; it consists of a navigable floodgate, a pumping station, flood walls, sluice gates, foreshore protection, and an earthen levee. The complex was designed to reduce risk for residences and businesses in the project area from a storm surge associated with a tropical event, with an intensity that has a one percent chance of occurring in any given year. This project was operated for the first time on August 29, 2012, in response to Hurricane Isaac. Location The project is located approximately one half mile south of the confluence of the Harvey and Algiers canals on the Gulf Intracoastal Waterway. The location is next to the Environmental Protection Agency's Bayou aux Carpes Clean Water Act (CWA) 404(c) area, a wetland area of national significance. Features The GIWW West Closure Complex consists of a navigable floodgate, a pumping station, floodwalls, sluice gates, foreshore protection, and an earthen levee. The project also required the dredging of Algiers Canal, as well as the realignment of Bayou Road. Project challenges consist of maintaining navigation traffic on the GIWW (a Federal navigation channel with heavy commercial barge traffic) and the location of the complex in relationship to the Environmental Protection Agency’s Bayou aux Carpes Clean Water Act (CWA) 404(c) area, a wetland area of national significance. A navigable floodgate When the gate is closed during a storm event, the 19,426 cubic feet per second (cfs) (551 m3/s) 11 bay pump station is required to evacuate the rainwater that is pumped into the Harvey and Algiers canals by 9 other pump stations along the canals. The pump station complex, which is the largest of its type in the world, consists of 11 each 5,444 horsepower Caterpillar engines. To minimize environmental impacts to the Bayou aux Carpes 404(c) area, the floodwall was constructed on the eastern edge of the wetlands, within from the western bank of the GIWW for a . The floodwall starts north of the pump station and gate structure with a water control structure across the Old Estelle Outfall Canal, and extends southward along the eastern edge of the Bayou aux Carpes 404(c) area. A canal closure wall connects the floodwall and navigable floodgate on the GIWW. A protective berm was constructed on the channel side of the floodwall to protect it from barge impacts. Foreshore protection was constructed