Canal Street in New Orleans, Louisiana is a major thoroughfare that runs through the city's center. It was named after a canal that was never built, Canal Street was established in the early 1800s and is the boundary between the French Quarter and the Central Business District.

Up until the early 1800s, it was primarily Creoles who lived in the French Quarter of New Orleans. After the Louisiana Purchase (1803), a large influx of other cultures began to find their way into the city. A number of Americans from Kentucky and the Midwest moved into the city and settled uptown. Along the division between these two cultures, a canal was planned. The canal was never built but the street which took its place received the name. The median of the street became known as the neutral ground, acknowledging the cultural divide. To this day, all medians of New Orleans streets are called neutral grounds.

The center of this picture is the neutral grounds. The tracks are a part of the street car system. You are looking towards the Mississippi River in this photograph