Great Lakes Megalopolis

Detroit is the Capital City!

The Great Lakes Megalopolis includes the group of metropolitan areas mainly within the Midwestern United States surrounding the Great Lakes region and the Southern Ontario area of Canada, but it also includes parts of Pennsylvania, New York, and Quebec. The region extends from the Milwaukee–Chicago corridor to the Detroit–Toronto corridor, and includes Indianapolis, Grand Rapids, Cincinnati, Dayton, Columbus, Cleveland, Toledo, Ottawa, Buffalo, Rochester and reaches Pittsburgh, St. Louis, and Kansas City. The region had an estimated population of 54 million for the 2000 Census and is projected to reach about 63 million by 2025


From Time Magazine - 1966

Another area is growing even faster, and will ultimately pose bigger problems. This is the potential "Great Lakes Megalopolis," which will soon stretch without interruption from Pittsburgh to Chicago, by the year 2000 will contain a population of 45 million. Fortunately, in the opinion of City Planner Constantinos Doxiadis, the great heartland megalopolis has a natural focus and headquarters in Detroit —if the city will only rise to the challenge.

As Doxiadis projects it, Greater Detroit will eventually cover 23,000 sq. mi., stretch 150 miles long, 220 miles wide, and include 37 counties: 25 in Michigan, nine in Ohio and three in Canada. The area will have a population of 15 million centered in the Motor City but with secondary concentrations at Port Huron, 55 miles to the northeast, Toledo, Flint, Saginaw, Grand Rapids, Lansing and Ann Arbor.

Read more: http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...#ixzz1GabvfAt9

Map: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedi...egaregions.png

Thoughts? Is this still relevant? The midwest megalopolis is the largest such region in the country, and would pose considerable influence on the country as a whole.

Remember the midwest is least prone to natural disaster too...the coasts will be swallowed evenutally!

Expanded Metro Detroit is only a 1/3 of Doxiadis' prediction, but the total region is 54 million [[2000), he predicted 45 million [[2000)

BAD IDEAL!! The tax base will be very expensive.

Detroit obviously hasn't risen to the challenge.

But it will inevitably have to play a bigger role as a hub in the region. Not sure whether that will happen sooner or later, but it's inevitable. [[cross reference this to the thread about high speed rail)

Oh, he finishes with the flaws of Detroit that still remain so today [[and ultimately/temporarily[[?) stunted the growth of Michigan):

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To be sure, Doxiadis added firmly, "Detroit's role is not the most important at present. It is an industrial center, but it does not provide services for a major urban area. It is not attractive as a center city."

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So basically, Detroit's flaws are cosmetic, and that explains why Chicago has rebounded to become the Midwest's best performing metropolis over the last few years of the 20th century and first decade of the 21st. If Chicago's mindset were in Detroit's physical location it would be a great city......

There really isn't a single "Midwest" megalopolis. There are three. The "Lake Michigan" megalopolis wraps around Lake Michigan from Green Bay to Muskegon via the Fox River cities, Milwaukee, Chicago, South Bend, Kalamazoo, and Grand Rapids. The "Lake Erie" megalopolis stretches in a roughly linear fashion from Saginaw to Pittsburgh via Flint, Detroit, Toledo, Sandusky, Cleveland, and Youngstown. The third [[and least developed) is the "Ohio Valley" megalopolis which is basically the cities of Indianapolis, Louisville, Cincinnati, Dayton, and Columbus as well as their hinterlands. A fourth would be the "Lake Ontario" megalopolis that includes Toronto, Buffalo, Rochester, and the surrounding areas, but that doesn't extend into the Midwest.

Actually, Doxiadis was kind of a fraud...

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Originally Posted by hudkina

There really isn't a single "Midwest" megalopolis. There are three. The "Lake Michigan" megalopolis wraps around Lake Michigan from Green Bay to Muskegon via the Fox River cities, Milwaukee, Chicago, South Bend, Kalamazoo, and Grand Rapids. The "Lake Erie" megalopolis stretches in a roughly linear fashion from Saginaw to Pittsburgh via Flint, Detroit, Toledo, Sandusky, Cleveland, and Youngstown. The third [[and least developed) is the "Ohio Valley" megalopolis which is basically the cities of Indianapolis, Louisville, Cincinnati, Dayton, and Columbus as well as their hinterlands. A fourth would be the "Lake Ontario" megalopolis that includes Toronto, Buffalo, Rochester, and the surrounding areas, but that doesn't extend into the Midwest.

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I think Detroit is more contiguously developed along the "Lake Ontario megalopolis". The area between Toronto and Windsor is seems far more developed the the area between Cleveland and Toronto.

Joel Garreau placed Detroit as the capitol of "the Foundry" in his 1981 book "The Nine Nations of North America". If you've never read this book, I truly recommend it. He really had quite the foresight of where we'd be today.

Plus, you can get it for 22 cents, plus s&h.

http://www.valorebooks.com/Search/IS...03/13/11&buy=3

Joel Garreau is also a fraud.

Really? How?

Garreau isn't so much an expert on cities so much as he's an ideologically driven salesman for sprawl. Reading his 1988 book Edge City convinced me that, as a scholar, he was pretty much worthless. That book is just one, long [[and literate) love letter to sprawl, fascinating to read today because it is now so dated and obviously wrong-headed.

according to this website we are in the "Great Lakes Megaregion"

http://www.america2050.org/maps/
http://www.america2050.org/great_lakes.html

Yeah, Garreau's love of edge cities is pretty solidly slammed in every Urban Planning class I've taken

He pointed the way but no one listened...and here we are 40 years later about right where he said we'd be if we didn't act...

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...944154,00.html

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Originally Posted by middetres

He pointed the way but no one listened...and here we are 40 years later about right where he said we'd be if we didn't act...

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...944154,00.html

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That is eerily accurate.

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Originally Posted by iheartthed

I think Detroit is more contiguously developed along the "Lake Ontario megalopolis". The area between Toronto and Windsor is seems far more developed the the area between Cleveland and Toronto.

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Southwest Ontario is mostly rural outside the few population centers. There is very little sprawl. On the other hand, Saginaw-Flint-Detroit-Monroe-Toledo-Port Clinton-Sandusky-Vermillion-Lorain-Cleveland-Akron-Warren-Youngstown-New Castle-Pittsburgh is very highly developed and full of sprawl. There is really only one spot on that course where there is a significant break in the sprawl. The stretch between Toledo and Port Clinton is mostly undeveloped, meaning you could technically say the "Lake Erie" megalopolis is more a "Saginaw-Detroit-Toledo" megalopolis and a "Cleveland-Youngstown-Pittsburgh" megalopolis.