This was particularly amusing. Gotta wonder how much rent Ford is charging GM. :-)

"This is not the first time Ford Motor Co. has invested heavily in Detroit. Over 40 years ago, Ford spearheaded and largely financed the construction of the Renaissance Center, one of the most prominent buildings on the Detroit skyline. It was envisioned as part of the rebirth of an already struggling city when it opened in 1977. It is now the global headquarters of rival General Motors"

Gm bought in 1996.

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

Didn't know that. Bet it wasn't cheap. :-) Are you from Detroit?

When I was a little boy I lived about six blocks from the station, and its height dominated everything around it. I also left for Navy boot camp at Great Lakes on a train from that same station, before it fell into ruin. It looks like between Ford -- which wants to develop Corktown (the area around the station) -- and Dan Gilbert and the Illitches Detroit may have a chance.

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"Politics is just show business for ugly people."

You joined the military and saw a lot of other places, but we all know Dee-Troit is where your heart is.:-) Would be nice to see it revived. I really hope it can happen. I have some great memories in my early 20's visiting friends in Motown and getting lost in areas I was too naive to know not to go into. :-)

My wife lived in Windsor and tells me Detroit was their town. Although it was two different worlds across the border in many ways, she tells me nobody in Windsor supported the Leafs, Blue Jays or Raptors. Detroit teams were their teams.. :-)

Yup

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

Yup, and there was always a few years in man's life when you went to windsor to watch the games, cause you drink. Just watch out at the boarder.

I have been through way to many rebirths of Detroit. I just don't buy it and the statistics support me. But they continue to say it's recovering, but no one is moving down there, the hip lofts, well the hipsters want families now.. there moving to the burb's

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

I think it's near a tipping point. As mentioned Gilbert, Illitch, and Ford are pumping huge money into the city. Rehabbing buildings for offices and living spaces (including micro lofts). At some point they need to get enough people into each to start earning some return. If the housing market (Quicken) goes south before then, and there is another crash/recession, things could go south quickly

Detroit has been last on the upturns and first on the downturns. It will be again.

For me, the low point in the life of Detroit -- one literally caught frozen in time -- was documented in photos of one of the abandoned public schools warehouses snapped by a Detroit News photographer. He'd been called to the scene by urban explorers who'd discovered a body while out on one of their forays among the ruined structures and buildings that have plagued the city since its economic decline began a serious acceleration at the start of the new millennium.

Memorialized during a long, cold 2009 winter in Detroit, the frozen remains of Johnnie Redding, a local man who'd fallen onto hard times due to drug addiction, are a stark representation of the crashing downfall of the Motor City, once the 'Automobile Capital of the World' and probably one of the most vital cogs in the Arsenal of Democracy that helped the United States and its allies defeat the Nazis and the Japanese in World War II.

Sadly, it took three calls by the Detroit News to authorities over two days before anyone could be troubled enough to come collect the remains of Mr. Redding, who'd apparently fallen (or was pushed) down an elevator shaft in the structure. A later autopsy report revealed he'd died of a cocaine overdose and those he was smoking the drug with may have panicked and thrown his body down the water-filled shaft.




Johnnie Redding in happier days, before his drug addiction took over:

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"Politics is just show business for ugly people."

 
I forget the website but I there is one out there that takes you on a trip through many of the abandoned buildings in Detroit. I immediately wanted to visit and check out some of these old abandoned buildings. But then, I don't want to get shot either, so I guess I'll skip it.

Most of the cool old buildings are safe to go through during the day, they are mostly located in open space and not very populated. The "neighborhood" style places are where you might run into trouble. Lots of folks go through the old packard plant, Heck the train station use to be another cool place.

Yeah, lots of rich old guys have spent money fixing things up in the past getting ready to make a shit ton when the revitalization happens.

From a sports fan side of Detroit revitilizations.
The Lions have left and then returned to Detroit. The wings moved from Olympia to Joe Louis and now Howe Arena, The tiger are only on their 2nd Ball field, the Pistons, left and have returned to share Howe Arena with the wings. The problem is no one is working on the neighborhoods, just hot spots for urban kids and young adults to come down to. This will never rebuild the city. The city is just to big and sprawling they cant afford to keep the infrastructure, but the few left don't want to move out of their part of town. Maybe in another 20yrs there will be enough completely vacant places they can start shutting down service to areas, then the city would have some hope.

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Just Triing
Triathlete since 9:56:39 AM EST Aug 20, 2006.
Be kind English is my 2nd language. My primary language is Dave it's a unique evolution of English.

I hadn't heard that one. It is sad. Three calls with the newspaper calling. Imagine what kind of action a regular citizen would get.