Gilbert Renames Dime Building to "Chrysler House"

[Detroitnerd]

Clinton Township, 2028: This stretch of once-suburban Detroit draws photographers from all over the world. Tumbleweeds roll past derelict subdivisions. From a few of the buildings, squatters peer out, looking out for trouble. Streets cracked by the freeze-thaw cycle are patched with dung and sand. One last house looks decent, and its sprinkler system chirps to life. Here lives the last official homeowner of this exurban encampment, a man only identified as 313WX.
And he's remarkably upbeat.
"People used to talk about how great Detroit was, that people wanted city life and didn't want to live and work out here. I mean, why? It's great out here!"
He recalls that, in the 2000s and 2010s, when businesses and residents started abandoning these far-flung developments for the time-tested city and inner ring suburbs, he sat back and, as he puts it, "laughed my ass off."
He asks, "What does it mean that Chrysler, General Motors and Ford have all officially moved downtown? Or that the parts suppliers and new knowledge-based companies are moving down there. It' a hellhole. Until they get the schools fixed, nobody will want to live down there."
In a year when Detroit's population has surpassed 1 million for the first time since 1999, and with the floor fallen out of the exurban real estate market, it's a tough sell.
"Look at this place," the final taxpaying resident says. "This is freedom! I can ride my four-wheeler all over this place. And no crime! And pretty good schools, if you don't mind driving about 25 miles a day. I sure don't."
Etc., etc., ad absurdum...

[Jimaz]

Clinton Township, 2028: <funny anti-sprawl screed snipped>

I just finished watching this anti-sprawl documentary: Sprawling from Grace: The Consequences of Suburbanization [[©2008, total duration 82 minutes). It covers most of the anti-sprawl arguments in one neat, well-produced video.

Feel free to copy link to more relevant threads.