Lake St. Clair Needs to Finally Become a True Asset for the Inner Ring Suburbs

[nain rouge]

As an avid bicyclist/walker living in Metro Detroit, I often find myself frustrated by how poorly integrated our region is with Lake St. Clair. I can't just hop on my bike, head east and expect to be able to access the lake. And that sucks.

In many inner ring suburbs, people live only 5-15 miles away from the Great Lakes, the largest collection of freshwater lakes in the world. However, because of the way everything is designed, the experience for most citizens isn't much different from living in, say, the middle of Ohio. The way the southern shoreline of Lake St. Clair has been cordoned off by homes with private beaches and residents-only parks is simply unbelievable.

The message is clear for most inner ring suburbanites: hit 16 Mile if you want to experience Lake St. Clair. Below that, this lake isn't for you. That's not so terrible if you have a car - it means you might have to tack an extra 15 minutes onto your ride. It's a nuisance, but not a complete As an avid bicyclist/walker living in Metro Detroit, I often find myself frustrated by how poorly integrated our region is with Lake St. Clair. I can't just hop on my bike, head east and expect to be able to access the lake. And that sucks.

If you live on 9 Mile and Scheonherr, for example, riding the bus or biking up to 16 Mile adds a ton of time and hassle to your trip, and walking is out of the question. Sure, you could go down into Detroit instead - where access is a little better - and get to the lake that way, but travelling through that 8 Mile to McNichols pocket without a car is something I could only recommend for experienced locals. Plus, it's still quite a trip.

Why can't our imaginary citizen that lives on 9 Mile and Scheonherr take 9 Mile to the shore? It's asinine.

Imagine you're selling a home in Ferndale or Hazel Park. As it stands, Lake St. Clair doesn't provide much of a selling point. But imagine if there were buses on some of the mile roads actually came by regularly and could take you straight to the lake, and you could actually walk along the shore and to all the nearby restaurants. Somehow, I think that would make many people much more interested in your people. The lake would finally be a real asset for the people in those cities.

The provincialism displayed by some citizens in the Pointes and St. Clair Shores is hurting our entire region as a whole, which in turn hurts those cities as well. St. Clair Shores, for example, exists solely as a byproduct of Metro Detroit's success as a region. It's tied intrinsically to the fortunes of its neighbors. In the end, cutting of access to Lake St. Clair hurts it more than it helps it.

We all need to start looking at the bigger picture, and looking at our problems from a regional perspective. As they say - divided we fall, together we stand. Detroit, for one, is starting to get it with developments like the River Walk. And, ideally, more people would live in Detroit and enjoy such amenities. The truth is, though, that there will always be a large group of people that prefer suburbs over cities, and that's why making our inner ring suburbs as attractive as possible is integral to our regional future and to the ultimate redevelopment of strong urban cores. The people on 9 Mile are just as important as the people on Jefferson.