Temple Hotel is no more.

[MikeyinBrooklyn]

And Ilitch had the Old Unitarian Church torched Last Week

He caused the '67 riots, too. He knew it would drive down property values in the long run, making it cheaper to build his hockey arena half a century later. Any coincidence that hockey is just one letter off from "honkey"?

[chicagoforlife]

Not all these buildings are worth saving, this is obviously one of them....I can't think of anyone that would want to live in a building like this. It reminds me of the New Jackson Hotel here in Chicago, the inside of the place from what I've been told [[never been in there and never will go in there) that it looks like the setting of a horror movie. Detroit needs new development and saving some old buildings is fine but from the looks of it this building wasn't worth saving. What's the problem with it becoming a parking lot? That doesn't mean that it's always going to be a parking lot, it'll probably just be used as one until a developer comes along with a plan for the property.

[chicagoforlife]

In 25 years, there will be the exact same posting about our upcoming Illitchville Arena. Illitch Jr. will probably be begging for a half-billion for a fancy new arena promised to revitalize a dead New Center.

They don't build sports arenas the same way today as they did in the 70's so I disagree that there will be the exact same posting in 25 years. The arena's they build today are a lot better than anything built in the 70's that's for sure.

[chicagoforlife]

Hard to imagine how Mr. I and his planners got it so wrong, but they did.

Ilitch had nothing to do with building the Joe, he didn't even own the Red Wings yet when the Joe was opened.

[Danny]

Great idea. Innovative idea.

Didn't Detroit do something similar with a nearby football stadium?

Yes, it did, the construction crew torn parts of the old Hudson's Dept. Store warehouse building as part of the east south end foundation and future office building for Ford Field. Bodman Office is still there along with other tech companies. They get free or reduce access to all Ford Field games.

[drpoundsign]

I've always wondered about that, Too. I DO know that the Downtown was somewhat built up by 1803, but THEN the whole thing burned like Chicago three generations later. Then it was redesigned with the streets radiating like wheel spokes, as in DC and Paris. There were probably less than ten thousand living there at the time. What caused the City to Explode in Growth was really the Erie Canal further East [[which opened up the Great Lakes to the Ocean) and the railroads. By 1900, Cigars, pharmaceuticals, railway cars, stoves and carriages [[which paved the way for the horseless carriage) were being manufactured, and the City had 400,000 people in it. It absorbed nearby communities, forests and farms and the City Limits expanded-not unlike Los Angeles. The Auto Industry, and lack of a Subway System, caused it to Over Expand-it Quadrupled in population between 1910-1930 to about 1.8 million people.