I know there is many threads that addresses Bing and Snyder killing the light-rail on Woodward but I want to go back in time to the 70's. According to this piece in last week's story, there was an attempt to get a real transportation system in Metro Detroit.

Supporters said the light-rail project had been the region’s best chance at a rail-based transit system since the late 1970s, when the city was promised $600 million in federal funding but lost the money when Oakland and Macomb county leaders wouldn’t go along with the plan.
Now I was a kid in the late 70's so I had no idea back then that the region could have laid the tracks for mass transit but it's a damn shame that the leaders of the region could have came to some form of compromise. I can only imagine what were the factors in this deal being killed.

Suburbanites in fear of Black hoodlums coming in droves in their communities using the rails.

Detroiters in fear that they would lose one of their jewels to the suburbs.

The Big Three didn't want a dip in sales in their home market.

For the older posters maybe you have explained this before but what was the attitude during that time?

Finally, imagine if they would built the damn thing, how would Metro Detroit had turned out?