Hubbard Richard District Revitalized?
I was reading the Windsor Star today and it was talking about a revitalized, thriving paradise neighbourhood that looked like it was out of the suburbs, west of downtown and east of the bridge called Richard Hubbard. A decade ago it, it was slums. Now it has 93 new or restord houses, no blight with the exception of the MCS in the distance, a grocery store and many chain stores with only one vacant storefront, beautifully landscaped yards and no for sale signs anywhere. There was even a Mercedes parked in the driveway. I've seen dilapidated houses in Brush and Boston-Edison, yet this place is the exception? Reading about all the other neighbourhoods tanking in Detroit, how accurate is this article? Are there any other pictures of it? I can't seem to be able to find them in a regular google to verify what's being said. They had a picture pf a new townhouse complex, but I just find it hard to believe that an area of the city I've avoided for so many years because of what I saw over a decade ago is like the reporter describes. She actually suggests this neighbourhood should be an example for Windsor?
http://www.windsorstar.com/Jarvis+Re...243/story.html
Windsor's Anne Jarvis: Neighbourhood reborn in the shadow of the Ambassador Bridge
By Anne Jarvis, The Windsor StarDecember 7, 2009
When Canadians drive off the Ambassador Bridge into the U.S. and turn east into the neighbourhood called Hubbard-Richard in Southwest Detroit, they're genuinely shocked.
"What's this?" they want to know.
This isn't what they think of when they think of Detroit.
Indeed, this oasis is hard to fathom. The bold rebuilding of hijacked Hubbard-Richard, in the shadow of the giant and insatiable bridge, has been stunning.
"It was quite wonderful," said Father Leo Reilly, assistant pastor of historic Ste. Anne Church, the rock of the community. The parishioner who led the revitalization called it a miracle.
"It has become a neighbourhood again in the true sense of the word, where people care about each other, look out for each other, talk to each other," said resident Jim Garrison. "It's a nice place."
What can Windsor do about the bridge's blight on the city's west side? This is what Windsor can do.
A little over 10 years ago, Hubbard-Richard was a wasteland of decrepit buildings, overgrown vacant lots and barbed wire fences. Whole blocks were lost. There were drugs and crime. If you drove on nearby Vernor Avenue, you took your life in your hands.
The deterioration started in the 1970s and '80s. Then, say residents and activists, the bridge came, and the devastation began again. It did there what it's doing here, now. It wanted land. It bought people out. Others fled. Those who remained began to let their homes go. Said Vito Valdez, who grew up there: "It was bleak."
Now, 93 houses have been built or renovated. The Star's Dave Battagello took me on a tour last week. There are small storey-and-a-half houses with big dormer windows and porches and tall, narrow two-storey homes with high ceilings. They have pastel siding, some green, some yellow, some blue or beige, with white trim and big windows. Many are subsidized.
There is a handsome red and beige brick 65-unit apartment building for seniors. It has a courtyard with a garden and a pavilion. Many of the residents walk to Ste. Anne.
There are 64 smart red brick townhouses for single professionals who work downtown. We peered inside a window [[from the street). They're beautiful inside, with wooden staircases, art on the walls. Parked outside one was a Mercedes.
There are garages at the back. The yards are neatly landscaped. There are sidewalks, stylish streetlights and a small park with a garden, new trees and a modest but elegant sign announcing Ste. Anne's Gate.
It's like the suburbs. All within blocks of the bridge.
Most of what has been built is occupied. There were no For Sale signs.
A charter school has opened for at-risk kids, drawing students from across the city.
The neighbourhood grocery store, The Honey Bee Market, once the size of a corner store, expanded three years ago, quadrupling in size. It's another attractive red brick and stone building with large, ornate lamps, decorated for the season with green garland and red bows. It's one of the best grocery stores in Southwest Detroit.
Vernor west of the bridge, where many in Hubbard-Richard work and shop, is thriving now. There are popular chain stores, restaurants, hair salons, dentists, financial consultants, auto repair shops, bakeries, banks and pharmacies.
I saw only one vacant store [[unlike Ouellette Avenue in Windsor), and the street was bustling.
The non-profit organization that has developed much of the area just bought the old police station near the foot of the bridge and is planning a creative arts centre. A pedestrian bridge under construction will link the two sides of the freeways.
This isn't Grosse Pointe. The homes are modest. The area is still rough around the edges. And still hovering over all is the bridge. It owns 12 to 15 properties that the neighbourhood still wants but says the bridge won't sell. It owns the land around three sides of Hubbard-Richard, distinctive by the rundown buildings, lots that are either vacant or look like construction zones and fences, some with barbed wire.
Some streets are blocked off because the bridge has simply taken them [[the issue is in court). Rising into the sky nearby is the historic but crumbling train station, also belonging to bridge owner Matty Moroun.
But there are people, homes, jobs and businesses. This is a stable and ethnically and socially diverse community. People know each other. They sit on their porches and gather at the church plaza. Children play. Southwest Detroit is now an up-and-coming area of the city.
"People are really excited to see the neighbourhood growing," said Ken Koehler, who owns Honey Bee. "It reflects on everything."
And they've stopped the encroachment by the bridge.
Imagine all this in the shadow of the bridge in west Windsor, a stone's throw from the University of Windsor's new medical and engineering schools. Isn't this what we want?
Later this week, I'll tell you how Southwest Detroit did it -- and how Windsor can, too.
ajarvis@thestar.canwest.com
