Last Call for Cass Tech High School

[English]

My grandmother just called the office. She said she wished my grandfather [[Jan. '33) had lived to see this. Well, not to be disrespectful to an octogenarian, but I vehemently disagreed. I am so glad my grandfather never lived to see so much tangible evidence of his Detroit disappear. God knows he saw enough of it during his lifetime.

Look, folks. Until you get people with vision in the driver's seat of the CAY building, this *will* continue. Now imagine if someone had demolished Broderick Tower or the Whitney just because they were "empty eyesores." Sigh... so sad.

[Huggybear]

...Look, folks. Until you get people with vision in the driver's seat of the CAY building, this *will* continue. Now imagine if someone had demolished Broderick Tower or the Whitney just because they were "empty eyesores." Sigh... so sad.

Cass Tech is a great illustration of the expression, "when you point the finger at someone, four fingers are pointing back at you."

Cass Tech has thousands and thousands of living graduates. They saw this go onto DPS's bond issue, they saw the new building rising [[and must have known the old one was going to become a nonperforming asset on DPS's books), they became aware of the demolition plans, and not one - not even ones who live in Hollywood - came up with a single, concrete plan, much less one with funding. Instead, what we got was cries about how no one has any vision. It's ironic, it's sad, and it led to a predictable result.

This isn't about vision [[and almost never is when things get torn down). It's always about what you get for your money in keeping a building like this. The architecture was old [[but fairly drab and forgettable, even for its era). And like most schools of its era, the building was dark, depressing, inflexible, and energy inefficient. Even if New Cass Tech is expensive, buggy and architecturally bland, it may well have been that someone crunched the numbers and figured out that even if you tore it down and rebuilt it again in 30 years, it would be cheaper than locking into 50-60 more years with the old one. Who knows what major maintenance DPS deferred - and deferred - and deferred. There may have been some educational consideratons in changing classroom layouts, etc., but I'd bet the real reason why old Cass Tech was replaced was the cost of running it [[or bringing it up to modern standards). And many of those costs would have been continued in a private redevelopment.

[English]

Cass Tech is a great illustration of the expression, "when you point the finger at someone, four fingers are pointing back at you."

Cass Tech has thousands and thousands of living graduates. They saw this go onto DPS's bond issue, they saw the new building rising [[and must have known the old one was going to become a nonperforming asset on DPS's books), they became aware of the demolition plans, and not one - not even ones who live in Hollywood - came up with a single, concrete plan, much less one with funding. Instead, what we got was cries about how no one has any vision. It's ironic, it's sad, and it led to a predictable result.

It's also a great metaphor for Detroit as a whole.

[Hermod]

Cass Tech is a great illustration of the expression, "when you point the finger at someone, four fingers are pointing back at you."

Cass Tech has thousands and thousands of living graduates. They saw this go onto DPS's bond issue, they saw the new building rising [[and must have known the old one was going to become a nonperforming asset on DPS's books), they became aware of the demolition plans, and not one - not even ones who live in Hollywood - came up with a single, concrete plan, much less one with funding. Instead, what we got was cries about how no one has any vision. It's ironic, it's sad, and it led to a predictable result.

This isn't about vision [[and almost never is when things get torn down). It's always about what you get for your money in keeping a building like this. The architecture was old [[but fairly drab and forgettable, even for its era). And like most schools of its era, the building was dark, depressing, inflexible, and energy inefficient. Even if New Cass Tech is expensive, buggy and architecturally bland, it may well have been that someone crunched the numbers and figured out that even if you tore it down and rebuilt it again in 30 years, it would be cheaper than locking into 50-60 more years with the old one. Who knows what major maintenance DPS deferred - and deferred - and deferred. There may have been some educational consideratons in changing classroom layouts, etc., but I'd bet the real reason why old Cass Tech was replaced was the cost of running it [[or bringing it up to modern standards). And many of those costs would have been continued in a private redevelopment.

I just came back from a visit to my college alma mater [[class of 1961). All of the buildings which were there when i was a student are still standing and in use [[with the exception of a couple of faculty quarters torn down to make room for expansion of the dorms).

I saw my old dorm rooms [[built in 1850), the old Chemistry building [[1908), the English/history/math building [[1918), the engineering building [[1923), and the physics building [[1952). While the buildings have been expanded and modernized, they are still in use after all these years. How come they haven't become outmoded?