Hi all,

My first post here.

I've visited to Detroit a few times over the years [[From the Toronto area).

I can say truthfully there is much I enjoy [[some great architecture in parts of downtown in particular)

But of course, as discussions on this forum acknowledge, your fair City is not without its challenges.

As an outsider, I'm sure some of my questions [[if not most) have already been answered and/or debated to death; but in my time lurking on the forum there are a few for which I've never found complete answers.

I'm not going to try to stick them all in one post.....

But if you'll indulge me.....

One of Detroit's apparent challenges seems to revolve around they myriad of fiefdoms that exist in your area.

So many different governments and police forces and so on.

If nothing else, for any area facing financial challenges, this might seem a bit wasteful.

But it also strikes me as imposing many other challenges from depriving lower-income or struggling areas of the resources they need to fix things; to making difficult inter-regional co-operation on transportation, economic development and policing.

So I was wondering why Detroit has so many different citys/towns/counties etc?

And whether there has been any move to change this?

I have some familiarity w/the U.S. and while you do have 'mega-cities' [[ie. New York); you do, as a nation seem to have a lot of 'scattered' cities.

Is there something about the U.S. that this is the case?

I just contrast it w/here in Ontario where its relatively rare, we tend to consolidate our cities into much bigger governments; and/or having the 'regional' services together by having an upper tier local government.

Thanks for all for their input!