Minimal public services, high crime, a Third World / Soviet style population base of unemployed fatalistic masses, crumbling infrastructure and burned out buildings….it’s like Fallout 3-D. Seriously, they should drop Bear Grylls down there with nothing but a knife, an EBT, and a pack of Marlboros and give him 30 days until evac. It would be like a cross between Escape From NY and Bat 21.RTWT.
I remember being in Detroit in 91. There were no go neighborhoods then. Some of the people I was with wanted to attend a greek festival and it was pretty well established one block radius of the party was no go area. this was at a convention of National Guard officers. When the Army does not want to go there, you know that area is in the crapper. Even then when we drove out of town on the freeway you went through miles and miles of empty neighborhoods.
ReplyDeleteIt really makes me weep for the world we are leaving our children.
Remember, Rome didn't as much fall as crumble down around the edges.
ReplyDeleteI would so watch that.
ReplyDeleteThe camera work would probably suffer.
It's a bit difficult to set up a camera, walk back 400 yards so you can get footage walking towards it and then past, while a flash mob is chasing your white ass.
We were in Detroit two years ago. I drove directly to the Westin Book Cadillac, handed the car to the valet, and didn't leave the building till we drove out the next day, heading for PA.
ReplyDeleteAnd I was packing the whole time. Including at the reception. In evening wear.
Don't think we'll be going back any time soon.
http://www.commonwealthofbelleisle.com/
ReplyDeleteThink of Hong Kong on Detroit River. Detroit really has nothing to lose at this point, and yet it would never happen.
kx59, I think you're thinking of Les Stroud. Bear Grylis's vidcam guys are as crazy as he is, so a flash mob probably wouldn't phase them.
ReplyDeleteYep, got my survival shows confused.
DeleteNuke the site from orbit. Its the only way to be sure.
ReplyDeleteWC: diedoil. Ironic, actually.
A good entrepreneur would be setting up a live action Fallout: Detroit.
ReplyDeleteIt would be the reality show prequel to Robocop.
ReplyDeleteA sad end to a once proud city...
ReplyDeleteLook at a Google map. Massive parts of it are now forest. How about turning it in to a hunting preserve?
ReplyDeleteI'd feel a lot safer there with my Model 100 in my hands, and deer of bear hunting would justify that.
Transplant some grizzlies from Montana and I bet it would cut down dramatically on overnight street crime.
Could you hold off until Thursday? I have to connect through Detroit to go to Flint to see clients.
ReplyDeleteI would so watch that.
ReplyDeleteI'd even put out the shekels for Pay-Per-View, and I'm a cheap bastard.
I've been thinking for a long time that Detroit could be rehabbed, if you just gave up on the government part of it.
ReplyDeleteAnd hey, the government just declared bankruptcy. So, reverse their incorporation, and declare "Detroit" unincorporated Wayne County.
Though, for all I know, the county and state governments are just as fucked as the city, so that might not be enough degovernmenting to actually work.
Too, is "Detroit" itself the only problem area there? Like Los Angeles, there's a lot of "Detroit" that isn't technically Detroit.
ReplyDeleteChange the spelling of the name to "Detriot", and it'd be more descriptive of the place itself.
ReplyDeleteJim
Sunk New Dawn
Galveston, TX
Think Detroit and you can see this future now in its glorious reality.
ReplyDeleteDee-troit...a terrifying wasteland to many, and sure as Hell dangerous to be in the wrong place, at the wrong time. BUT..not quite as nationally portrayed. And do I carry there? Two; each.
ReplyDeleteHowever, my wife and I have been going there for many years. The Detroit Institute of Arts events, The Jazz Fest, the Detroit Kennel Club Benched Show at Cobo Arena, the annual Thanksgiving Day parade [over a million people on Woodward Ave.]restaurants, and other cultural/social venues are all attractive and peacefully well-integrated.
In fact, any good ol' bigot would die of cultural contradictory input, at any major event. As mah fren' Willie Lee usta say, "It don be who you is; it's how you be's."
OTOH, The Residents and regular visitors pretty well know where safety ends and car-rocking territory begins. Much of the City is devastated, with isolated patches of habitation around small churches and or community orgs. That said, the population would handily fit into about a 1/4 of it's present acreage.
As it is, there is near wilderness in many areas. See this:
http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20090402/METRO08/904020395.
There is a lot more to be found by searching online: architectural tours, homesteading tours, ruination tours, etc.
However, for me -- remembering the Magnificent Downtown Detroit of the '50's, I will always now see it as the Tombstone of Failure for The Great Society of LBJ, and the real face of such well-meant efforts. That ACT eventually destroyed the value of property and the self-respect of the poor. Yet..despite it all, I have met many, many hopeful and positive people of all races in Detroit.
A City is not a monolith of one particular stereo-type, but there is no doubt that stereo-types are quickly arrived at, when one encounters the worst realization of them in person.
No answer here: my impractical dream would be to see the uninhabited sectors mined for steel and concrete, the side streets erased , and the land made available as small acreage homesteads, with no city services.
Enter the sci-fi novel, for those who would...but don't stereotype Detroit. Nor, racially profile it. There is yet hope for New Civilization when 'how you be's' once again counts for who is human, and who is not.
It would be interesting if a private corporation could arrange to get the city of Detroit and large chunks of its suburbs under its complete control, with full immunity from prosecution and lawsuits, on a "we'll take it as-is deal: If we succeed we get all the proceeds, if we fail we're the only ones who lose money." Offer free moving service to anyone who wants to leave, homesteading for those who want to come.
ReplyDeleteThink "Pure Enterprise Zone." 20 years without government in the way and it might get turned around, if, and only if, the fed dot gov also left them alone.
Be an interesting experiment, one that the dot gov can't risk, because it might be successful.
What do the Insurrection Act of 1807 and Detroit have in common? Detroit is the only domestic American city to be occupied by Federal troops three times:
ReplyDeletehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_Detroit_riot
Google "Detroit Riots" and you get to choose multiple years - 1943, 1967 or 1913.
Coleman Young inherited a vibrant city in the early 70's, and walked away from a Snake Pliskin type nightmare 20 years later.
ReplyDeleteSome of that was because of the UAW gutting the American auto industry, and some was simply buying votes with welfare checks and government jobs.
Either way, it's a long time since Detroit had a Republican mayor, and when it did, the place worked.