City of Detroit as Urban Laboratory and New American Frontier

I thought I'd share this recent post from my blog. [[I looked for TOS to see if it was legal to post your own stuff, but couldn't find it. This is non-commercial and on-topic and others have posted my stuff here before without issue).

It's a look at whether Detroit is in fact uniquely positioned to be an urban innovator. It's size and powerful brand are in fact drawing a new flow of migrants with big dreams and big ideas.

http://theurbanophile.blogspot.com/2...y-and-new.html

The focus is obviously the city, not the suburbs [[which are about the same as most other Midwest city 'burbs).

"But as with Youngstown, one thing this massive failure has made possible is ability to come up with radical ideas for the city, and potentially to even implement some of them. Places like Flint and Youngstown might be attracting new ideas and moving forward, but it is big cities that inspire the big, audacious dreams. And that is Detroit. Its size, scale, and powerful brand image are attracting not just the region's but the world's attention. It may just be that some of the most important urban innovations in 21st century America end up coming not from Portland or New York, but places like Youngstown and, yes, Detroit."

I've always thought the best way to grow or rebuild is to add on to existing well-developed areas. A development authority should encourage urban village areas to redevelop density first before empty spaces in between are redeveloped. I'm not saying that anyone should forcibly be relocated, just new development should be concentrated within smaller zones before spreading back out in to the urban countryside. With concentrated development would come proper city services. The city doesn't want to spend money to repave a street with one house on it, but chances are greater if the street is full of houses and businesses. Of course this is all rather irrelevant without a commuter[[not circulator!) styled transit system to tie it all together and provide one of the basic essentials of urban living[[No transit, no city).