Executive Committee Meeting 10-15-24

President's Report

Page 87 of 95

CITY PLANNING AND ARCHITECTURE

be to the taste of its oldest residents. Those who remained true to what is now known as the “other Detroit” during the worst years fear that new developments will once again leave them behind. Of course it’s important to get Detroit back on its feet, but not by starting from a clean slate. Instead, it’s all about putting in the missing pieces of the puzzle, while putting back in order the ones that are still in place. Several organizations such as Arise Detroit or Detroit Future City are involved in the movement, and take account of the lives of the inhabitants. But the city is still too vast for its population, and some planners see the Detroit of tomorrow as an “archipelago” of revitalized neighborhoods, connected by public green spaces—urban agriculture, parks, solar and wind farms—echoing the ribbon farms of the city's early days. Who knows what will become of it...

developed, such as the Q Line in 2017. In the center, old buildings are being restored, or else demolished and replaced by others, such as the J. L. Hudson store. Some neighborhoods seem frozen in a time when things were still good. The likes of Indian Village, Palmer Woods, and Sherwood Forest still have their opulent houses, which became more affordable at the height of the crisis, yet which are now inaccessible to many. Others experienced a rebirth, such as Livernois Avenue, known as the “Avenue of Fashion”, under 7 Mile Rd, a once thriving Black commercial area where stores and restaurants have made a reappearance. Still others have striven to preserve their identity at all costs. Core City, just west of Midtown, refused to be renamed “Eastern Corktown”. Projects such as True North and The Caterpillar, small housing developments inspired by Quonset huts, semi-circular prefabricated structures made of galvanized corrugated steel, have garnered it a popularity which may not

The Miles of Detroit This land surveying system, born at the end of the 18th century, aimed to divide the new American territories into townships, themselves subdivided into one square-mile plots, along east-west and north-south axes. In Detroit, Zero Mile is Campus Martius, marked by a plaque in the ground. Just like Justice Woodward, 19th-century surveyors came up against resistance from the heirs of the ribbon farms and had to start their calculations upstream of the river.

and the generalization of freeway infrastructure at the expense of public transport. Left behind, the Black population would be unable to quit the confines of the city center, falling victim to what sociologists would later call redlining . This discriminatory practice of not investing, and therefore refusing loans, in certain geographical areas is not specific to Detroit, even if the city has been a hotspot of the practice. For Black people, the border is 8 Mile , a frontier marked in some places by a wall. The White districts are found beyond this border. It’s essentially a situation of apartheid. Drained of its most affluent inhabitants, Detroit, a victim of “White flight”, gradually withered. A City in Neglect Efforts were made. Several important buildings, such as One Woodward and The Qube, were built in the 1960s. Then in the 1970s came the Renaissance Center, intended, as its name suggests, to help encourage the rebirth of a traumatized city. A case of too little, too late. The economic downturn was too far advanced. There were still empty buildings and the legacy of abandoned social programs. Detroit shrank and became

fragmented. Its inhabitants were now living in a city that was too big for them, in disconnected neighborhoods. At the turn of the century, entire tranches of the city became weed ridden, a low-skilled service sector replaced the manufacturing industry, and large isolated ghettos became “reservations for the poor”, according to the phrase coined by historian Thomas Sugrue. For him, the decline of his city was inseparable from the racial problem, discrimination in the workplace, and the flight of White capital. In 2013, when Detroit declared bankruptcy , it was estimated that 40% of its street lamps were no longer working and at least 78,000 buildings were abandoned. The New New Deal However, the end of the first decade of the 21st century saw new projects being brought to the table. The Riverwalk, a large promenade that runs along the river, began its development in 2007, in a program that continues today. Leisure areas have grown out of urban wastelands, such as the Dequindre Corridor, along a disused railway track. Bicycle paths and public transport are being

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City of Design Established in 2004 by UNESCO, the network of creative cities has the mission of advocating and promoting cultural diversity and encouraging the creative, social, and economic potential of local communities. In 2015, Detroit was the first U.S. city to be included in the Design category. With a well-rooted design industry, design schools (such as Cranbrook), the organization of major annual events in the field, the importance of the built environment, and so forth, the city ticked all the boxes, and its history and know-how got official recognition. To further promote this dynamic sector, the municipality launched the DC3 (Detroit Creative Corridor Center) in 2010, to support the industry, which now represents a significant growth lever for local employment and the local economy. Detroit Month of Design takes place in September T p. 127.