Metro Detroit now smaller than Phoenix?

[Bham1982]

Metro Cleveland actually has the worst population loss in the nation, and is shrinking while Metro Detroit is growing, yet Cleveland has had rapid transit for many decades, including a heavy rail line through the best neighborhoods, which extends to the airport. Cleveland also has far more regional cooperation, including regional transit, libraries, parks, and planning. IMO, Detroit's ills are much more complicated than lack of transit [[or lack of regionalism).

[gameguy56]

Metro Cleveland actually has the worst population loss in the nation, and is shrinking while Metro Detroit is growing,

Metro Detroit is growing?

[Bham1982]

Metro Detroit is growing?

Yep, barely, though. Technically we won't know for sure until 2020, in the next official Census, but the most recent estimates [[released last Thursday) showed Metro Detroit was growing, and Metro Cleveland had the worst population loss in the nation.

[nain rouge]

I would take the estimates with a grain of salt. Greater Cleveland has actually performed about equally to Metro Detroit, both slightly down from 1970 population levels.

[Cincinnati_Kid]

I would take the estimates with a grain of salt. Greater Cleveland has actually performed about equally to Metro Detroit, both slightly down from 1970 population levels.

Cleveland isn't even Ohio's largest city anymore, Columbus is. Maybe people are moving from Cleveland to Columbus.

[nain rouge]

Oh, you Ohio people and your cities. You can never say, "We have a lot of interesting cities in Ohio!" It's always, "X Ohio city is trash, but Y Ohio city [[which I happen to live right next to) is the one Ohio city with culture/class/etc.." People that aren't from Ohio just find that weird and unconvincing, just so you know.

[Gistok]

Cleveland isn't even Ohio's largest city anymore, Columbus is. Maybe people are moving from Cleveland to Columbus.

Or... and this is why I think all these statistics about cities MSA's and CSA's is nothing but smoke and mirrors....

Columbus has annexed parts of 2 other counties in Ohio to give it almost 800,000 people at over 220 sq. mi., wile Cleveland is still at it's 80 sq. mi., and nearly 400,000 people. In metro areas Columbus is STILL Ohio's 3rd largest city [[metro 1.8 million), with Cleveland being the largest with 2.8 million. and 300,000 pop. Cincinnati being second at 2.1 million.

Ohio nicely illustrates how statistics can be manipulated to whatever argument you want to make...

[313WX]

Oh, you Ohio people and your cities. You can never say, "We have a lot of interesting cities in Ohio!" It's always, "X Ohio city is trash, but Y Ohio city [[which I happen to live right next to) is the one Ohio city with culture/class/etc.." People that aren't from Ohio just find that weird and unconvincing, just so you know.

Michigan people do the same thing, albeit to a lessser and more annoying extent.

For example, there are actually people in this state who think Grand RApids should be this state's major city, while Royal Oak is the poster child of big city culture and lifestyle [[while both blatantly ignoring that big elephant named Detroit in the same room).

I never understood why Michigan and Ohio people do that crap. It is only unique to this region though.

[wolverine]

Whatever... metro Windsor's 400,000 people should be counted in Detroit's count since there are commuters between the two...

Cool, we'll be adding Milwaukee's metro to Chicagoland then. Fair is fair

[Gistok]

Cool, we'll be adding Milwaukee's metro to Chicagoland then. Fair is fair

You might as well... the Chicago CSA already stretches as far as the Michigan state border... 2 states away....
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_metropolitan_area


One thing going in our favor... the Windsor metro area starts less than a Mile from metro Detroit... and there are thousands and thousands of cross border jobs...

[Cincinnati_Kid]

Or... and this is why I think all these statistics about cities MSA's and CSA's is nothing but smoke and mirrors....

Columbus has annexed parts of 2 other counties in Ohio to give it almost 800,000 people at over 220 sq. mi., wile Cleveland is still at it's 80 sq. mi., and nearly 400,000 people. In metro areas Columbus is STILL Ohio's 3rd largest city [[metro 1.8 million), with Cleveland being the largest with 2.8 million. and 300,000 pop. Cincinnati being second at 2.1 million.

Ohio nicely illustrates how statistics can be manipulated to whatever argument you want to make...

Thx. I see you've done your homework......

[Hermod]

Oh, you Ohio people and your cities. You can never say, "We have a lot of interesting cities in Ohio!" It's always, "X Ohio city is trash, but Y Ohio city [[which I happen to live right next to) is the one Ohio city with culture/class/etc.." People that aren't from Ohio just find that weird and unconvincing, just so you know.

I spent two months in Dayton, Ohio one week.

[ElbertHanks]

We can play smoke and mirrors all day. For example, Miami's MSA runs all the way north to West Palm.

One thing you cannot ignore is that the Detroit MSA/CSA is experiencing zero growth and is essentially the same population that it was in 1970. Newer parts of the region simply cannibalize the older parts and pass it off as growth.

MSA's such as Phoenix, Houston and Dallas have experienced massive population growth during the same time period.

[Detroitnerd]

If we want to have something more than zero growth, we have to keep and attract young people.

Young people can tell when a city is serious about them or simply bullshitting.

Here's a great post from RustWire about that.

http://rustwire.com/2012/12/10/citie...-they-ask-for/

[313WX]

If we want to have something more than zero growth, we have to keep and attract young people.

Young people can tell when a city is serious about them or simply bullshitting.

Here's a great post from RustWire about that.

http://rustwire.com/2012/12/10/citie...-they-ask-for/

Nice link Detroitnerd.

You can easily replace "Cleveland" with "Detroit" in that article.

[Novine]

"MSA's such as Phoenix, Houston and Dallas have experienced massive population growth during the same time period.'

This is true and is a good indicator of how badly things are messed up in southeast Michigan. But all three of these cities are relatively young and starting from a base that was minuscule compared to Detroit. In 1950, Phoenix had 1/20th the population of Detroit. Even if Detroit had continued to grow, there's no way it could have matched the kind of growth those cities have experienced.

[mwilbert]

I suspect that within the next 20 years, metro Phoenix will be shrinking. The climate in the southwest wasn't great to start with, but at the rate it is deteriorating, I expect it to become a serious deterrent to people moving there.

They might also run out of water, but unless there is a severe drought they will probably just buy up the water rights of the farmers/ranchers.

[Hermod]

We can play smoke and mirrors all day. For example, Miami's MSA runs all the way north to West Palm.

It is a continuous urb from Miami to West Palm.

[iheartthed]

If we want to have something more than zero growth, we have to keep and attract young people.

Young people can tell when a city is serious about them or simply bullshitting.

Here's a great post from RustWire about that.

http://rustwire.com/2012/12/10/citie...-they-ask-for/

Oh man, did this hit the nail on the head:

So, this is a totally radical position for some odd reason and a bunch of people are probably going to attack me in the comments for even saying it. But why on earth doesn’t Cleveland try to be more like New York, or Boston or San Francisco?

I’m serious. There is not a secret formula. The places that are succeeding, they aren’t making a riddle of their methods. They are working very hard to make their environments hospitable to young people. How are they doing that? Through a whole movement called “livability.”

What is livability? Well it incorporates a whole bunch of things: bustling sidewalks, community spaces. But if I had to summarize it succinctly, I would say it is the freedom to get around and lead a fulfilling life without a car. This is exactly what New York, San Francisco, Chicago, Boston and a handful of other cities that are winning the young-people-attracting game are focused on.

[nain rouge]

I think this is a good counter to that Rust Wire article:

http://www.thebaffler.com/past/dead_..._shakin_street

My target here is not their power, but their vacuity. Our leadership class looks out over the trashed and looted landscape of the American city, and they solemnly declare that salvation lies in an almost meaningless buzzword [["vibrancy") — that if we chant that buzzword loud enough and often enough, our troubles are over.

The Baffler has mocked, analyzed, and derided money’s cultivation of hipness since our earliest days in print. Just think of all the permutations of urban hipness that have flickered by since we undertook that mission: Rollerblading near water. “Potemkin bohemias” like Chicago’s Wicker Park. Richard Florida’s “creative class.” And while each in turn drew the cheers of the bystanders, utilities were privatized to disastrous effect, the New Economy came and went, the real estate bubble grew and burst, the banks got ever bigger, state governments declared war on public workers, and the economy went off a cliff.


It is time to acknowledge the truth: that our leaders have nothing to say, really, about any of this. They have nothing to suggest, really, to Cairo, Illinois, or St. Joseph, Missouri. They have no comment to make, really, about the depopulation of the countryside or the deindustrialization of the Midwest. They have nothing to offer, really, but the same suggestions as before, gussied up with a new set of clichés. They have no idea what to do for places or people that aren’t already successful or that have no prospects of ever becoming cool.

But yes, if we build transit in Detroit, we will be awesome and vibrant and cool like New York City just like that!

[iheartthed]

I think this is a good counter to that Rust Wire article:

http://www.thebaffler.com/past/dead_..._shakin_street



But yes, if we build transit in Detroit, we will be awesome and vibrant and cool like New York City just like that!

I don't think it did. It was long and didn't read it all but the gist of it was attacking the vaguely defined concept of "vibrant", correct?

That's exactly what the Rustwire article didn't do. The Rustwire article gave a concrete definition of vibrant and explained exactly why Cleveland, and other cities of similar fortune, are failing to attract the types of people who go to those vibrant cities. [[Why would anyone pay $2,000/month for a studio apartment in Brooklyn if they could live a similar car free lifestyle in Detroit for a tenth of the cost?)

This isn't even a foreign concept to cities like Cleveland and Detroit. It's not hard to find a photo of Detroit or Cleveland with sidewalks that bustle with activity similar to levels of what you'd see in parts of New York, Boston or Washington today. But that type of activity in Detroit and Cleveland did not exist in cities whose mobility paradigm was handcuffed to the steering wheel of a car.

[nain rouge]

No, the main point I got out of that is that improved "vibrancy" does little for the vast majority of Americans. If you were already "cool", if you already have options and money, it doesn't do the down and out in Detroit much good if you move into Woodbridge. There will be increased tax revenue, but the gentrifying neighborhoods will demand a huge chunk of that for the desired improvements in their neighborhoods. Where do all the displaced people go?

"Vibrancy" is too often just moving the problem around, taking the "vibrancy" [[small businesses, shopping, and people doing stuff) of the suburban strip malls and reimagining it within an urban context. But Joe and Jane on McNichols are still as screwed as ever.

[iheartthed]

No, the main point I got out of that is that improved "vibrancy" does little for the vast majority of Americans. If you were already "cool", if you already have options and money, it doesn't do the down and out in Detroit much good if you move into Woodbridge. There will be increased tax revenue, but the gentrifying neighborhoods will demand a huge chunk of that for the desired improvements in their neighborhoods. Where do all the displaced people go?

"Vibrancy" is too often just moving the problem around, taking the "vibrancy" [[small businesses, shopping, and people doing stuff) of the suburban strip malls and reimagining it within an urban context. But Joe and Jane on McNichols are still as screwed as ever.

Okay, so skimmed more and still don't get how this rebuts effectively what was said in the Rustwire article. If you want to say that the decline of manufacturing was the direct cause of the decline of the city of Detroit then you must acknowledge that 90% of the Detroit area auto industry takes place outside of Detroit's borders. So with that in mind, NAFTA actually means very little to the city of Detroit's future. Detroit City would still be better off investing in the things that have worked to save other major city centers than worrying about manufacturing.

[nain rouge]

There's a direct, obvious connection between what constitutes "vibrancy" and what young affluent people want. But I think one of the more telling discoveries in all this, as evidenced by the comments to the Shakin' Street when it was also posted on Huffington Post, is how deaf, dumb, and blind the many that demand "vibrancy" are to such connections. They seem to imagine it's all some magical, intrinsic fact of life. No. It's just what you think is cool, essentially.

The mayors of many urban cities court "vibrancy" and thus the wealthy because they want to be in charge of a big, important city, like New York or San Francisco. It's all about ego, and not so much about what makes sense. Detroit was vibrant when it was a bunch of working class stiffs, the men going to the corner bars while their wives shopped at all the little retail strips and the kids were allowed to run amok.

I've yet to see how vibrancy works outside aside from creating urban playgrounds for transient wealthy people.

[bailey]

That's exactly what the Rustwire article didn't do. The Rustwire article gave a concrete definition of vibrant and explained exactly why Cleveland, and other cities of similar fortune, are failing to attract the types of people who go to those vibrant cities. [[Why would anyone pay $2,000/month for a studio apartment in Brooklyn if they could live a similar car free lifestyle in Detroit for a tenth of the cost?)

...all things being equal. By that I mean, you need a job to pay the rent no matter what it buys you. That doesn't seem to be the choice here. Detroit can be the most vibrant, walkable, place on the planet. However, if all the anchor businesses are 50 minutes from downtown, it's not really going to work.