Shrinking Cities: A Dinner Invitation

I just left Detroit, where teaching urban planning classes with the International Honors Program’s “Cities in the 21st Century” semester. We’re in for an exciting semester; students and faculty will look at the major urban issues while traveling together to Sao Paulo, Brazil; Cape Town, South Africa; and Hanoi, Vietnam. We were in Detroit for two weeks, getting to know each other, and using the city as our first case study.

Detroit has gotten a good amount of press recently for its declining population and wilting industrial base. As a native Midwesterner, I’m drawn to the Detroit’s plight. My hometown of Cincinnati has faced similar hardships, with a shrinking urban core, a declining population and a loss of industries and good jobs to the suburbs and beyond. Rust Belt cities in the region are all struggling with the new reality of fewer people, fewer jobs and more empty buildings and land.

Detroit was the powerhouse of the 20th Century. The birthplace of the Fordism, Detroit grew rapidly at the turn of the last century, as people flocked to the manufacturing plants in the area. The Ford Motor Company promised wages at an astounding $5 a day. General Motors, Chrysler and American Motors also established their headquarters in Detroit, making the city the center of the automobile industry. The rapid urbanization brought tremendous wealth to the area, and the city’s architecture reflected that.

According to Stephen Vogel, former dean of the University of Detroit Mercy School of Architecture, an astonishing 80% of all war materials produced during World War II either were made in Detroit, or in Russia using Detroit engineers. During this boom period, 2000 new workers came to the city every day.

The industrial might of Detroit won the war, but the post-war population of the city rapidly decided. Tax breaks were given to businesses to encourage them to move the suburbs. FHA loans were denied to non-whites, further increasing spatial segregation. Cold War fears didn’t help. According to Vogel, Federal officials worried that an atomic strike at Detroit would cripple American industry, so conscious efforts were made to spread the nation’s manufacturing might throughout the country.

Civil disturbances - caused in-part by the loss of employment - and cross-district busing further exacerbated white flight. The results after 40 years of population loss; Detroit now has only 40% of the population it had 50 years ago. In a geographically large area — Detroit is the size of San Francisco, Boston and Manhattan combined — the population loss led to a sense of emptiness and decay in the areas hit hardest by the population loss.

(Image courtesy of Dan Pitera, Detroit Collaborative Design Center, via Greg Pasquali)

Even today, 20,000 people are leaving the city each year. Detroit was hit especially hard by the recent economic crisis. Kurt Metzger of Data Driven Detroit supplied some bleak statistics: the city had 60,000 foreclosures between 2005 and 2010; this, combined with decades of population loss, has led to a stunning 40 square miles of vacant land in the city. Those that do remain in the city are mostly poor and black. Unemployment is staggering; the City has recently suggested the number might be as high as 50%. Economic conditions reflect social conditions — some 78% of births in the city are to unwed/single mothers. What should Detroit - the penultimate ‘shrinking city - do?

Offical, formal efforts to rebuild and revitalize the older, formerly densest parts of the city have met with mixed success. There are some bright spots in terms of development in downtown Detroit; the Tiger’s Comerica Park attracts sizable crowds and has revitalized small patches of retail near the park. But after the game, most fans drive back home to the periphery of the city, leaving the downtown empty.

The official government planning response to the shrinking city has been the amorphous ‘Detroit Works‘ project. The project will ostensibly call for the removal of city services to those neighborhoods who have faced the greatest population loss, with the idea that ‘shrinking’ the city is the appropriate response to Detroit’s new reality. The plan, however, has been criticized by community activists for being vague and unclear its its full intentions.

Despite the city’s struggles, Detroit has its successes. For all the negative media attention Detroit receives, you’d never guess there would be a market a mile away from downtown that’s been around since 1841 and attracts 40,000 shoppers on Saturdays. The immense Eastern Market is a huge community resource.

Our group was hosted by the amazing Arts League of Michigan (ALM), housed in the historic Virgil H. Carr Cultural Arts Center. This beautiful Beaux Arts building was constructed in 1895 as the home of the Harmonie Society, a musical society of German immigrants. The club was a place offering fine dining, tavern, card rooms, bowling alley, lounges and musical events. Oliver Ragsdale, Jr., President of the ALM, gave students a tour of the building, showing off the nice details here and there before getting to the big “wow” finish — a still-unrestored theater on the buildings third floor. It’s a magical place, begging to be brought back to its old glory, and Oliver has made that his life’s mission.

Students met with a panel of young entrepreneurs who are creating new and exciting projects in Detroit. Emily Doerr recently started Hostel Detroit, aimed at not only providing an affordable place for visitors to stay in Detroit, but also to offer educational tours of the city. Kelli Kavanaugh started Wheelhouse Detroit Margarita Barry started ‘I am Young Detroit‘, aimed at highlighting these young entrepreneurs.

The vitality of the Eastern Market, the drive of Oliver Ragsdale, and enthusiasm for the city by the young entrepreneurs all show that Detroit is still very much a vibrant and inspiring city. Dan Pitera made the case for Detroit in his inspirational opening speech, asking students to think of Detroit as a dinner party. Say you invited 50 people to your party, but only 25 show up. What would you do? Would you sit around and mope, feeling sorry for yourself? Or would you, as Dan said, “throw the best damn party you can?”

Related posts:

• AP: Blacks more likely to breathe polluted air
• On Street Art and Public Space in Buenos Aires
• The Lost Spaces of San Francisco
• Gigapixel Panoramic Photo of London
• Shepard Fairey Comes to Cincinnati
• The Floating Suburban Tea House
• Incredible Graffiti Art by Philip Bosmans, aka ‘am…
• Liu Bolin Hides in the City