City living

[Bham1982]

Two things here: 1) you don't need large apartment buildings to have high density neighborhoods, and 2) there was a lot of multi-family housing in Detroit that was lost to neglect and/or urban renewal demolition.

Agreed with both points, but I don't think that means Detroit had remotely comparable density to Manhattan. It's a huge stretch to say that tons of apartment buildings were demolished [[true) and there was lots of overcrowding [[also true) therefore 1950-era Detroit was the same as 1950-era Manhattan. It was more like a 1950 version of present-day LA [[fairly dense, due to overcrowding, but not really structurally dense over large geographies).

Anyway, here is the density heat map from 1950 which has been shared on this forum before:

And note that the densest areas in Detroit back in 1950 [[which are small geographically) only have density above 30k. Manhattan's current average density is above 70k. 70 years ago it was closer to 100k, with neighborhood peak densities well above 200k.

Just to illustrate, the overall density in Brooklyn and the Bronx today match the peak densities shown in the 1950 Detroit map. And we're talking over 100 square miles compared to a few square miles in Detroit. Those boroughs were denser still back in 1950. Queens peak density tracts are even denser, though overall Queens density is lower.

So Detroit, at peak density, in the peak neighborhoods, only had density roughly comparable to average densities over huge geographies in the Outer Boroughs today. Fairly high density, but not really close to Manhattan density.

At a smaller neighborhood level, though, 1950-era Detroit didn't even match the present density of neighborhoods in NYC considered somewhat suburban. Bay Ridge, Brooklyn or Forest Hills, Queens, or Jamaica, Queens [[all far outer borough neighborhoods, nowhere near Manhattan, and considered semi-suburban) all have higher peak densities today than the peak densities in 1950-era Detroit.