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(Guardian) Interesting "The drive along eerily empty ghost freeways into the ruins of inner-city Detroit is an Alice-like journey into a severely dystopian future"   (guardian.co.uk) divider line 339
More: Interesting, Detroit, inner-city, freeways, American South, supermarket chain, Motown, urban farms, abduction  
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16532 clicks; posted to Main » on 12 Mar 2010 at 7:47 PM   |  Favorite    |   share:  Share on Twitter share via Email Share on Facebook   more»   |    Get this fabulous T-Shirt and impress the methane out of your friends! shirt it!



339 Comments   (+0 »)
   

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nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:16:00 PM
Perducci: Every time I see a story about the utter collapse of Detroit, I wonder why no big corporations (or foreign governments, or just a couple of rich guys) don't come in and buy everything. Buy a pile of real estate, businesses, and even formerly public buildings for pennies on the dollar.

It might be a post-industrial wasteland today, but it's still centrally located, with access to transportation, etc.

What would they do with it? What would you do with the people currently living there?

There are plenty of good locations near vital cities that would be cheaper to buy and develop. Detroit does not have a viable work force available for what you propose. The UAW workers have been spoiled and would refuse the work.
 
Frank N Stein
2010-03-12 08:16:21 PM
SweetDickens: Actually not a troll at all....just an observer of the facts.

You might try it, instead of playing wow or with yourself.

[unsuccessfultroll.jpg]
 
jimi32
2010-03-12 08:17:35 PM
i42.tinypic.com
meh...this is where I live
 
ZAZ [TotalFark]
2010-03-12 08:18:58 PM
twomutts: lots that are slowly turning back into marshland

Do you mean literally wetlands, or just overgrown?
 
Lord Summerisle
2010-03-12 08:19:50 PM
I'm really getting into urbex. Detroit would be my #2 dream destination, after Chernobyl. Or maybe Metro 2 under Moscow, if it exists.
 
cmb53208
2010-03-12 08:20:14 PM
I think we should help Detroit renew by adding a Detroit tag to FARK.
 
warfarkingeagle
2010-03-12 08:20:38 PM
SweetDickens: Frank N Stein

Actually not a troll at all....just an observer of the facts.

You might try it, instead of playing wow or with yourself.

.001/10
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:20:55 PM
SweetDickens: Ah America.......were the cities you build last but a hundred years but yet in Europe theirs last thousands.....how is your dynasty working out???

You do realize that the USA is only a few hundred years old, don't you?? It makes it real tough to have a thousand year old city in these circumstances. We have some cities along the east coast that reach the 400 year mark.

And Detroit is just one city, we have more.

Beyond that, your comments are pointless.
 
CygnusDarius [TotalFark]
2010-03-12 08:21:51 PM
SweetDickens: Frank N Stein

Actually not a troll at all....just an observer of the facts.

You might try it, instead of playing wow or with yourself.

One name: Benzovaux (new window).
 
Frank N Stein
2010-03-12 08:23:38 PM
Some houses in Detroit:

2.bp.blogspot.com

4.bp.blogspot.com

1.bp.blogspot.com

3.bp.blogspot.com

source (new window)
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:24:07 PM
Cyclometh: nicksteel: Cyclometh: Any Farkers from that area? How bad is it, really? I sense a lot of hyperbole in the article.

It's pretty accurate. Most of the suburbs are a different story, better but not terrific.

The city suffered the most severe case of white flight back in the 60s & 70s. Add to that a couple of mayors who did their best to make sure that the surrounding suburbs did not want anything to do with the place drove the final nail.

There was that complete bastard who ran the place for years (decades?) post-white flight and basically put the city where it is now. Can't remember his name, but he was a piece of work.

I know who you are talking about. He actually went on TV and told the people of Detroit to stop shopping in the burbs.
 
farkinawsome
2010-03-12 08:24:07 PM
ZAZ: In their shadows, the glazed eyes of the street zombies slide into view, stumbling in front of the car.

Cool, a genuine postapocalyptic wasteland.

if Eisner was still in charge of Disney he would be selling tickets.
 
albuquerquehalsey
2010-03-12 08:24:38 PM
www.celebritycrunch.com
Boobies American
 
Braindeath
2010-03-12 08:24:46 PM
I'm waiting to see if Philly is headed in that direction.
 
Frantic Freddie
2010-03-12 08:26:59 PM
nicksteel
We have some cities along the east coast that reach the 400 year mark.



Santa Fe,New Mexico is the oldest capital city in the US.
 
NNH
2010-03-12 08:27:17 PM
Sounds delightfully depressing. I'll have to make sure to watch it.

As a side, did Julien have to link to the most lifeless version of The Passenger?

/prefer Siouxsie's version anyway
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:28:04 PM
Frantic Freddie: nicksteel
We have some cities along the east coast that reach the 400 year mark.



Santa Fe,New Mexico is the oldest capital city in the US.

good point, I completely overlooked that part of the country. And parts of Florida.
 
OscarTamerz
2010-03-12 08:28:10 PM
The greed-fuelled willingness of the auto barons to siphon up black workers from the American south to man their Metropolis-like assembly lines and then treat them as subhuman citizens, running the city along virtually apartheid lines, created a racial tinderbox.

Yeah it was the fault of the auto barons 70 years ago and not the fault of the black subhumans in the 70 years since. Detroit might as well be sub Saharan Africa and when I lived there in the early to mid 80s it was common to refer to it as little Uganda.

What really killed Detroit was letting the popular vote elect the series of Mugabe level crooks that devastated the politics for the last 40 years and ran Detroit like their own personal country with armies of thugs posing as body guards. Nobody cares about Detroit any more than they do about Uganda or Rwanda.

What they should want is getting basic behavior to something approximating human and given the city's political structure and law enforcement that won't happen until the entire structure goes bankrupt and the entire corrupt political structure is swept away. Disincorporate Detroit and get rid of the cops and have the place policed by the state and county. Let the school districts be run by the state and throw all the politicians in prison or in the Detroit river.
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:31:20 PM
OscarTamerz: The greed-fuelled willingness of the auto barons to siphon up black workers from the American south to man their Metropolis-like assembly lines and then treat them as subhuman citizens, running the city along virtually apartheid lines, created a racial tinderbox.

Yeah it was the fault of the auto barons 70 years ago and not the fault of the black subhumans in the 70 years since. Detroit might as well be sub Saharan Africa and when I lived there in the early to mid 80s it was common to refer to it as little Uganda.

What really killed Detroit was letting the popular vote elect the series of Mugabe level crooks that devastated the politics for the last 40 years and ran Detroit like their own personal country with armies of thugs posing as body guards. Nobody cares about Detroit any more than they do about Uganda or Rwanda.

What they should want is getting basic behavior to something approximating human and given the city's political structure and law enforcement that won't happen until the entire structure goes bankrupt and the entire corrupt political structure is swept away. Disincorporate Detroit and get rid of the cops and have the place policed by the state and county. Let the school districts be run by the state and throw all the politicians in prison or in the Detroit river.

The big influx of African-Americans from the south was due to WWII. There was lots of defense work to be done there and very little in small southern towns. The auto barons had nothing to do with the movement.
 
Perducci
2010-03-12 08:31:35 PM
nicksteel:
What would they do with it? What would you do with the people currently living there?

There are plenty of good locations near vital cities that would be cheaper to buy and develop. Detroit does not have a viable work force available for what you propose. The UAW workers have been spoiled and would refuse the work.

I'm talking about buy-and-hold. It wouldn't cost too many millions to buy up every foreclosed property in particular areas. I didn't say anything about developing it -- maybe you don't do anything at all with it for a couple of decades.

There might be "plenty of good locations near vital cities", but I doubt there are many other places where you can easily buy up hundreds of acres of urban and suburban land in close proximity to one-another.

For a billionaire or a big corporation or a government, this sort of long-term investment might be a very smart move.
 
jdog71
2010-03-12 08:32:58 PM
I'll just leave this here...

i178.photobucket.com
 
Cyclometh
2010-03-12 08:35:24 PM
jdog71: I'll just leave this here...

Request hi-res version plox.
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:37:17 PM
Perducci: nicksteel:
What would they do with it? What would you do with the people currently living there?

There are plenty of good locations near vital cities that would be cheaper to buy and develop. Detroit does not have a viable work force available for what you propose. The UAW workers have been spoiled and would refuse the work.

I'm talking about buy-and-hold. It wouldn't cost too many millions to buy up every foreclosed property in particular areas. I didn't say anything about developing it -- maybe you don't do anything at all with it for a couple of decades.

There might be "plenty of good locations near vital cities", but I doubt there are many other places where you can easily buy up hundreds of acres of urban and suburban land in close proximity to one-another.

For a billionaire or a big corporation or a government, this sort of long-term investment might be a very smart move.

buy and hold for decades? I can't think of two many millionaires who would want to invest money for something like that.

For all practical purposes, Detroit is in the middle of nowhere. There is nothing to gain because it is close to suburbs. It is a sink hole that would do nothing but suck up whatever money you spent on it.
 
JohnAnnArbor
2010-03-12 08:38:55 PM
A few years ago, they replaced a number of overpasses of I-94 in Detroit during the same summer. So a number of them were out at the same time. It looked like a retreating army had dynamited the bridges. The sad thing was, it fit the look of the surrounding areas.
 
JohnAnnArbor
2010-03-12 08:40:58 PM
There are salt mines beneath the city. I wonder if there's ever been oil exploration in Detroit.
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 08:41:02 PM
OscarTamerz: The greed-fuelled willingness of the auto barons to siphon up black workers from the American south to man their Metropolis-like assembly lines and then treat them as subhuman citizens, running the city along virtually apartheid lines, created a racial tinderbox.

Hurrumph. THis may be the only time that the Europeans regard the American south as better than anything.
 
twotowner
2010-03-12 08:41:33 PM
Cyclometh:
There was that complete bastard who ran the place for years (decades?) post-white flight and basically put the city where it is now. Can't remember his name, but he was a piece of work.

Colman A Young. The people that elected him over and over deserved the bu fu they got. And later they fell for Kwame Kilpatrick because they sooo learned their lesson. Of course, next door my hometown of Dearborn wasn't guilt free. Had ourselves quite a racist for a mayor in Orville Hubbard.

Oh, and Detroit celebrated 300years since its founding a few years ago. Who knows if it will make it to 400.
 
beoswulf
2010-03-12 08:41:52 PM
nicksteel: The big influx of African-Americans from the south was due to WWII. There was lots of defense work to be done there and very little in small southern towns. The auto barons had nothing to do with the movement.

That goes further back to Henry Ford and his policies to destroy the labor movement by flooding the factories with black sharecroppers willing to take any job that didn't involve working behind a mule's ass.
 
jaytkay
2010-03-12 08:42:00 PM
Cyclometh: jdog71: I'll just leave this here...

Request hi-res version plox.

R. Crumb - A Short History of America - 1799 x 1296 - 733k (new window)
 
cmb53208
2010-03-12 08:42:08 PM
Lord Summerisle: I'm really getting into urbex. Detroit would be my #2 dream destination, after Chernobyl. Or maybe Metro 2 under Moscow, if it exists.

I can see urbex as a money-making proposition for Detroit: the downtown hotels can offer urbex packages, and maps to abandoned skyscrapers nearby, like the 34-story Broderick Tower overlooking Grand Circus Park. Hell, the overturned piano in the old ballroom of the Lee Plaza Hotel may well be the most photgraphed musical instrument in the country.
 
Frank N Stein
2010-03-12 08:43:43 PM
Cyclometh: There was that complete bastard who ran the place for years (decades?) post-white flight and basically put the city where it is now. Can't remember his name, but he was a piece of work.

Coleman Young?
 
Erzsebetvwv
2010-03-12 08:45:55 PM
Cyclometh: Any Farkers from that area? How bad is it, really? I sense a lot of hyperbole in the article.

It really is not that bad. In the past five years, I have lived, worked, and gone to college in Detroit. I will admit that most of that time was spent in the downtown area, which isn't bad at all, but I worked in the neighborhoods on the west side. In my time there, I never felt afraid or threatened.

Working in an elementary school, I certainly saw things I wanted to change and heard the sad stories of some of the kids. The statistics in the article about poverty and illiteracy are accurate, if a few years old. Still, I don't see the city as the wasteland they make it out to be. At this point, there are a lot of people working to change things for the better, and I hope that they can.
 
Al!
2010-03-12 08:47:03 PM
SweetDickens: Ah America.......were the cities you build last but a hundred years but yet in Europe theirs last thousands.....how is your dynasty working out???

Ah Europe... where everyone comes out of the woodwork several times a century to kill each other with such reckless abandon that the only reason they are even competitive globally is because Americans have the sense to bail them out and watch their backs.

/Am I doing it right?
 
olddinosaur
2010-03-12 08:50:18 PM
Back in the 1960s I went to college withn a bunch of guys who bought the ghost town of Jerome, Arizona, for $1 an acre.

They turned it into a tourist attraction and made a sh*tpot of money.

Roughly 15 miles south of Corpus Christi is a little ghost town called Chapman Ranch, it has 2 big brick school buildings, one HUGE main building, and about 6-10 occupied houses. Everyone else has moved.

I am a firm believer in ghost towns and would love to buy one, if I could get enough people to come along.

In a worst-case scenario, you buy a bunch of houses dirt cheap and can't sell them at a profit, so you gotta sell them dirt cheap.

Does a big boy cry over that?
 
rdub1968
2010-03-12 08:51:42 PM
Cool article, and looks like a good film.
I'm rooting for Detroit since I have a house in the suburbs, once I sell it though I'll never go back unless its to visit family.
Now in Charlotte and loving it.
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 08:52:19 PM
Al!: Ah Europe... where everyone comes out of the woodwork several times a century to kill each other with such reckless abandon that the only reason they are even competitive globally is because Americans have the sense to bail them out and watch their backs.

/Am I doing it right?

Pretty accurately, too.

**cough, cough** Milosovich.
 
CornFedIowan
2010-03-12 08:54:09 PM
rppp01a: Still at the forefront of the American Dream, Detroit is fast becoming the Boobies-American" city.

This accidental filter pwnage is not getting the respect it deserves.
 
Forbidden Doughnut
2010-03-12 08:56:09 PM
nicksteel: SweetDickens: Ah America.......were the cities you build last but a hundred years but yet in Europe theirs last thousands.....how is your dynasty working out???

You do realize that the USA is only a few hundred years old, don't you?? It makes it real tough to have a thousand year old city in these circumstances. We have some cities along the east coast that reach the 400 year mark.

And Detroit is just one city, we have more.

Beyond that, your comments are pointless.

THIS.

/ and I hope we never become as densely populated as Western Europe...
 
jdog71
2010-03-12 08:56:14 PM
Cyclometh: plox

Link (new window)
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 08:57:06 PM
beoswulf: Why not bulldoze the empty parts of the city, condense the outer areas, convert whatever isn't polluted ground into farms, homestead it with every black male getting a couple acres and a mule and we call it even as far as reparations go.

Lawyers. People still own the abandoned parts. I suspect that it's a tangled legal nightmare. If you could buy everyone, EVERYONE out cheap, I sort of like your homesteading plan. Urban homesteading worked out pretty well in Baltimore in the early aughties. Heck, there is a Pigtown Pride festival now. You HAVE to be a yuppie to even consider that.
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 08:57:16 PM
beoswulf: nicksteel: The big influx of African-Americans from the south was due to WWII. There was lots of defense work to be done there and very little in small southern towns. The auto barons had nothing to do with the movement.

That goes further back to Henry Ford and his policies to destroy the labor movement by flooding the factories with black sharecroppers willing to take any job that didn't involve working behind a mule's ass.

Ford had blacks working for him long before the labor unions came along. I have yet to read that he brought in black share croppers.
 
asstronaut
2010-03-12 08:58:11 PM
FTFA: "rabid dogs patrol the streets"... Really? Rabid, not feral? I find it unlikely. Did they get them tested? I could have believed "I saw a rabid dog" but this report seems to fit with the British fear of rabies. Every place they hate has rabies. It's all over France and Italy, too! And "no rabies exists in the UK because its an island".
 
Veteran of the Cola Wars
2010-03-12 08:59:11 PM
There are Native American settlements just as old as many European cities.

'Cept some white morans had to come along and ruin them.
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 09:00:09 PM
They lose points for not working in "non-Euclidian" or "Cyclopian" into the article.
 
nicksteel
2010-03-12 09:00:21 PM
Veteran of the Cola Wars: There are Native American settlements just as old as many European cities.

'Cept some white morans had to come along and ruin them.

Care to name ten of them and where they were located?
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 09:00:53 PM
Veteran of the Cola Wars: 'Cept some white morans had to come along and ruin them.

Yeah. White Europeans.
 
fireclown
2010-03-12 09:01:56 PM
nicksteel: Care to name ten of them and where they were located?

I'll start. There were a mess of Pawtomak living right around where I'm sitting right now. Long since relocated, killed, or bred out of existance.
 
arrjayaitch
2010-03-12 09:02:15 PM
Damn, that whole article reads like a JG Ballard book.
 
shower_in_my_socks [TotalFark]
2010-03-12 09:02:29 PM
Panty Sniffer: As far as I can tell the downtown area of Detroit still looks spiffy.


I was in Detroit a few months ago for a business meeting. We were on one of the upper floors of the Renaissance Center, which is right on the river in downtown. Looking across the downtown area, our host told us that once you got a block in from the river, 50% of the office space was vacant. What you're seeing downtown is a facade of high rizes that are 50% vacant.

Driving into downtown, one of the most enduring images I saw was that of a church all alone, surrounded by blocks of vacant lots. I was told the neighborhood that had once surrounded it had been demolished.

Across the river, on the Canadian side, is a thriving casino district. The river acts as a buffer between the two cities. I was told that casinos are being built on the Detroit side of the river now, with the city trying to steal some of the action away from their Canadian neighbors. You can imagine the potential harm of having gambling casinos in the middle of an economically depressed city.

They're trying to woo more upper-middle class families into moving away from the nicer suburbs and into downtown, but the infrastructure is gone. No good schools. No good stores. Any well-off family that moves into the city is faced with driving their kids 20+ miles to get to school every day.

Also, for anyone interested in amazing coverage of what's happened in Detroit, let me show you DETROIT BLOG (new window). I don't know if the guy has won any awards for his work there, but he deserves to.
 
Bohemian
2010-03-12 09:02:47 PM
FTFA: "Forty-seven per cent of adults in Detroit are functionally illiterate;"

When almost half of your population can't even farking read no wonder people don't have the common sense to solve their problems. Yea, illiteracy is just a symptom of the larger problem but it has to be solved.
 
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