**US President Barack Obama will travel to New Orleans on Thursday for a close-up look at the city’s recovery since Hurricane Katrina.**In his first visit since taking office, he will tour a school in an area devastated by the storm’s aftermath four years ago and meet residents.
Mr Obama made the city’s rebuilding one of his campaign pledges.
Opposition politicians have criticised the brevity of the visit, which is scheduled to last less than four hours.
Slow recovery
Mr Obama’s first stop will be at the school in the Lower Ninth ward.
This mainly poor area of New Orleans was particularly hard hit by flooding in the wake of the hurricane, which left up to 80% of the city submerged.
The school is the only one out of six to have reopened in the neighbourhood.
“The people of New Orleans deserve more than a drive-through daiquiri summit"”
Steve Scalise, Republican Congressman
According to some estimates, less than a quarter of the residents of the Lower Ninth ward have returned, compared to 75% for the rest of the city.
President of the local neighbourhood council Vera McFadden told the BBC she felt poor areas of the city had been neglected by Washington.
"I really wish he could just ride through the neighbourhood to see what’s going on.
“We have children and they deserve a state-of-the-art school. The community is trying to raise money, but we’re just forgotten down here.”
Local input
The president will also hold a town-hall-style meeting at the University of New Orleans, where residents who managed to secure a ticket through a White House website will get the chance to voice their concerns.
But for many, the whirlwind visit is not enough, especially after Mr Obama pledged to restore trust in government during a campaign stop in the city in 2008.
Louisiana Republican congressman Steve Scalise was particularly scathing.
Referring to New Orleans’s lax liquor laws and its reputation as a popular destination for party-goers, he said the city’s people deserved “more than a drive-through daiquiri summit with the president”.
The White House quickly rebuffed the criticism, saying that more than $1bn had been spent on “1,000 projects - work on roads, bridges, Army Corps construction, schools, health centres and more” in New Orleans alone.
One resident planning to capitalise on the hurried nature of the president’s visit is Leah Chase.
The owner of a New Orleans soul food restaurant told the White House she would like to prepare a take-away order for the president.
According to the city’s Times-Picayune newspaper, the White House has made time in the president’s busy schedule for a short stop at Mrs Chase’s restaurant to pick up such Southern food staples as gumbo, shrimp Creole and fried chicken.