Fabulous Ruins - Your semantic interpretation?

[East Detroit]

When you think "The Fabulous Ruins of Detroit".... are you thinking:

a) Detroit is a Fabulous Ruin
b) Metro Detroit is a Fabulous Ruin
c) Detroit has some Fabulous Ruins, like Italy
d) It is fabulous that Detroit is ruined


I always though it was C, but I am beginning to think that many people were interested in or thought it meant one of the other options.

[Retroit]

C. But more technically, that Detroit had some fabulous buildings that have fallen into ruin.

[gibran]

c... when I was a guest student at Wayne [[long long time ago) I always rode around the old brown stones and was amazed... then after I moved south and saw the sprawl of Dallas, Houston, Austin, San Antonio etc... and other areas I would drive around to find similar areas where there were "ruins" and it was so sad that our city planners abandoned the inner cities and it's buildings and old neighborhoods...some preserved them well and some didn't... so now when I go to Washington and walk the streets of Georgetown etc.. I could only imagine a little foresight would have gone a long way...could you imagine a vibrant and diverse community in Detroit stretching from Trumbull/near old Central or west to east to Grand Blvd... up gratiot ....the homes in detroit were well built in th ecity proper and would be worth a fortune elsewhhere...funny what fear and prejudice gets yah...many of the neighborhoods still has pride and hope..they just need infrastructure and people [[ i know, I know; that's what we have been moaning about for years on here)..but good thread and yes retroit past tense..only if we continue to let it go...man that show "after people" is interesting isn't it.

[DetroitDad]

c... but a and b aren't that far off... unfortunately.

[Stosh]

I vote for E. Of course E isn't an option, so let me elaborate.
If I had placed E in the mix, in the question I would have had it like so:

E: No ruins are fabulous.

While I admit that the A and B option are tempting, I reject the notion that somehow ruined buildings are "cool" or "hip". They are what they are, eyesores.

[Retroit]

Can I change my answer to E.?

[Blarf]

E: No ruins are fabulous.

While I admit that the A and B option are tempting, I reject the notion that somehow ruined buildings are "cool" or "hip". They are what they are, eyesores.

Does this apply to Rome as well?

[larrym]

It saddens me that my home has become a ruined city.

[MIRepublic]

Given the original intent of the site, Lowell showcasing the ruin of some of Detroit's storied, abanonded properties, I guess I've never even thought of it anything other than Option C, though, I wouldn't say "like Italy", at all, given the pretty decent gulf of disparity [[for the most part) between why buildings were abandoned/are being abandoned in Detroit and why they were in Italty.

[RickBeall]

Definately A

I've wandered through ruined buildings in Detroit for 20 years. Most of the buildings I used to wander through are long gone and I'm always amazed that there is always more.

[Stosh]

Definately A

I've wandered through ruined buildings in Detroit for 20 years. Most of the buildings I used to wander through are long gone and I'm always amazed that there is always more.

I wonder whether they should charge admission to these buildings, like they do in Rome for the Forum now. I'd bet that would cut down a lot on the random wanderer, and possibly get some cash money to rehabilitate some salvagable buildings.

[Linda from Detroit]

I would have to pick "C". All of the ruins are so sad, but the tour that affected me the most [[other than downtown ruins) was the one on apartment buildings. My very first apartment was in the one building featured. It was called Glendale on the Park...and I lived there from 1972-1975. They were small apartments, but very well maintained. Mostly seniors lived there at the time and it was quite quiet. Rent was $75.00 a month including all utilities [[except the phone). On the old forum under discussing these ruins it showed a picture of the Farrand Apartments that were just across Woodward from where I was...their rent was $5.00 more and they included phone service, switchboard and package dropoff service. Oh, how things have changed!

[RickBeall]

Maybe in 10 years I'll be exploring the fabulous ruins of the Renaissance Center.

[Stosh]

Maybe in 10 years I'll be exploring the fabulous ruins of the Renaissance Center.

Well, good luck with that. I'm sure if that happens you'd be able to pick up a few choice exploring properties closer to home as well.

[bigtreble]

C. Any structure built before my birthyear has historical significance and cannot be easily [[financially-justified) replicated today.

[RickBeall]

I don't think your view is very common.

I believe American culture has no conception of "ruins" having any positive value: "fabulous ruins" is an oxymoron.

In America we value functional buildings and empty lots. A "ruin" is only worth the dirt it sits on. If the Roman Coliseum existed in the USA, we would either renevate it into something useful like condos or a multi-level parking structure, or level it. But it would never just sit.

[Lorax]

You can turn a ruin into something positive, as they have in many European cities by manicuring parkland around them, and developing residential building, high-rises and elegant low-ries buildings as you may see in Palmer Park [[which I'm sorry to say is itself looking more like a ruin every day).

I say reopen the central boulevard leading to MCS, plant large trees from a tree farm, not these cheap Walmart stick trees, plant gardens, fountains, gravel pathways, good antique lighting, not sodium vapor examination lights, and develop the surrounding vacant land with really high-end residential, as is the case in San Francisco with the Pan American Exposition grounds.

Of course, this takes the right economic environment, which we don't have right now, so the MCS and other ruins need to be mothballed until a master plan and vision for what Detroit will be in the future is written.

[President Sekou]

G. No ruins are fabulous when you actually have to live amongst them all day, its just that abandoned shithole where some crackheads are likely getting high and screwing all day. Its only cute when its 30 miles away from the tidy suburban oasis where those who think it is fabulous live.

[RickBeall]

President Sekou wrote:
>>G. No ruins are fabulous when you actually have to live amongst them all day,
>>its just that abandoned sh*thole where some crackheads are likely getting high
>>and screwing all day. Its only cute when its 30 miles away from the tidy suburban
>>oasis where those who think it is fabulous live.


The American zeitgeist has spoken.

[Stosh]

President Sekou wrote:
>>G. No ruins are fabulous when you actually have to live amongst them all day,
>>its just that abandoned sh*thole where some crackheads are likely getting high
>>and screwing all day. Its only cute when its 30 miles away from the tidy suburban
>>oasis where those who think it is fabulous live.


The American zeitgeist has spoken.

And quite rightly, I might add. Think about it. Where do you live, and are you prepared to see the same thing you see in Detroit in your neighborhood? And I couldn't help but notice the obligitory mention of the freaking Roman Coliseum again. I'm glad you have about 800 years to wait.

[terryh]

C. They just don't make em like that anymore. The ruins have a character you just don't see in the metal, brick and glass monstosities that litter the suburban landscape.

[Mackinaw]

I don't like the phrase...we should not be content or pleased to have ruins. A city is supposed to have efficient, moving pieces...those pieces can and should be historic. We should not have to settle on letting our history sit, decay, and ultimately vanish, because that is what happens to ruins...especially in this part of the country.

[Lorax]

What shouldn't be lost on everybody here, is that maintaining ruins in Europe not only employs thousands of people, but keep restoration firms in business.

Suppliers of maintenance equipment, i.e. construction firms, hardware stores, landscape and gardening businesses, in fact, they employ MORE people, and contribute to the economic vitality as well as the quality of life, aesthetics, etc, than they would have had they been used for their original purposes.

With tourism as an incidental benefit.

We as Americans really don't know how to see any benefit in designating, and maintaining ruins as an economic engine.

What's most frustrating, is that many American cities don't know how to use their greatest assets.

Detroit is a great case in point- the waterfront is perhaps our greatest natural asset, though for years it was allowed to be used for the purpose of warehouses, docks, industry, etc.

It certainly looks better today than it has since Cadillac landed here in 1701, but it should look like Lakeshore Drive in Chicago. Planning is the key. Chicago benefitted from the city beautiful movement in the late 19th century, and had a few blips as well along the way. Detroit seemed to get some of the architecture, such as the David Whitney Building, Book properties, etc, but seemed to miss much of the general quality planning, largely in reaction to the exploding population in the early 20th century. Still no excuse for poor planning.

Detroit's greatest assets today would include the built environment- perhaps the best concentration of residential architecture in America, fantastic high rises and mid-century modern architecture as well.

Another asset, as an aside, which has never been developed, is the fact that Detroit and Michigan have turned out more musical artists than perhaps any other single place on earth- so where is our American Music Hall of Fame?

Additional assets would include our world class ruins.

Why not develop these ruins as people-oriented places, transportation hubs, residential developments, like in Europe.

The models are all around us, Paris, Rome, Dresden, Athens. The hard work has already been done, why not take a page from these other cities, and make these ruins an economic engine, turning a perceived eyesore into a destination.

We're going to need vision if we're going to re-make ourselves in the wake of the auto industry's demise.

This is one of many ways we can do it.

[Russix]

A. Detroit is a Fabulous Ruin.

The buildings only symbolize the height of the fall, not as the reasons for it being ruined. If you demolished every building that anyone ever called an eyesore, you’d still be left with: racism; corruption; functional illiteracy; weak mass transit; high unemployment; dysfunctional city services; pollution; drugs; gangs; guns; thieves; declining tax base; high taxes; and a huge city debt.

[RickBeall]

Hi Lorax,
Lorax wrote:
>>As another example I can cite from those in my previous post, you could take any architecturally significant church sitting in a field alone where there used to be a Detroit neighborhood, develop a public park around it with reflecting pools, lawns and landscaping, quality lighting, and plan a low-rise neighborhood of cottage style structures in a semi-dense neighborhood, rather like the villages of England, where the local ruin acts as a public square. It establishes a focal point to a future neighborhood.

You have some great ideas. I have seen some churches torn down that would have been a great ruin. There was a Victorian church in Brush park that burned down 11 years ago that would have been great to anchor a park. Imagine the massive Packard plant as a mile long ruin with grass growing inside, designed for picnics and such.

You could think of the new bike path in the raild road right away as one of your ideas that was accidentally completed. There is some industrial design in the bridges and walls and such.

Given the massive population decline in Detroit these areas could exist.

But the problem is that the wounds are too green, the ruins are not old enough to pass from blight to beauty in the Detroiter's eyes. Also, Americans don't understand anything that is not "functional". Its un-American. We can't see it.