Originally Posted by Bham
The HUGE difference is that Clarkston had a tiny population. That's way different than a city that had hundreds of thousands of people. Fact is, if you'd built up that level of urban infrastructure, you generally have an urban core today ASSUMING your region is STILL doing OK.
As a region, you have to work with what was built. Houston may not have a true urban core, but that's because it boomed later. In Detroit, meanwhile, we had a major American city of 1.85 million, with a population density of about 13,000 people per square mile. Now it's a giant hole of decay smack dab in the middle of it all. And that's the problem. Houston has no equivalent to that, and that's why it can get away with not having an urban core.
Detroit's urban core, meanwhile, was a vital part of its built environment.
Originally Posted by Bham
I get what you're saying, but I don't see how Detroit was as magically unique as you say. Developers don't go around purposefully building slums. All those apartments and duplexes in Detroit you call "undesirable" were once shiny, new, and in demand, like housing in any other booming urban city at the time.
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