Duggan wants to clean up Detroit Freeways

**Airforceguy** · January-15-23, 08:04 AM

Duggan wants to clean up Detroit freeways. Have at it, MDOT says

"With the National Football League Draft in Detroit 15 months away, Duggan is on the hunt for litter in the city, of which the city's freeways and service drives have plenty. He also wants the medians along Detroit's freeways to get mowed more than twice a summer.

"I cannot stand the overgrown grass and the trash," the irritated third-term mayor said last week. The mayor recently asked the Michigan Department of Transportation to let the city take over cleaning and mowing along freeways — a dirty job that some Detroiters assume is already the mayor's responsibility."If I'm going to get the blame, I might as well have the responsibility," Duggan said last week. "We'll do a lot to beautify those freeways."

Like other things, Duggan thinks city departments can do this work better than others. So he's taking on the task as part of a new pre-draft city beautification blitz, which he touted to city business, government and philanthropic leaders at last week's Detroit Policy Conference.

"There is so damn much garbage in the city since COVID," Duggan said on stage at the MotorCity Casino.[/QUOTE]
https://www.detroitnews.com/story/ne...s/69802970007/

**Danny** · January-15-23, 08:15 AM

Does that mean cleaning up the hidden homeless encampments under the bridges, too?

**401don** · January-15-23, 12:46 PM

Do they still use prison work crews for that? Seems like it's a win-win for non violent offenders to offer a lighter sentence for community work.

**Gistok** · January-15-23, 04:10 PM

When parts of the city freeway embankments look like total crap because of insufficient mowing, the growing of weeds, and erosion of the embankment due to mowing after heavy rainfall... and all they want to do is get rid of liter... sounds like making a meal out of a morsel...

https://www.google.com/maps/@42.3781...7i16384!8i8192

**Zozo** · January-16-23, 02:32 PM

Boston, NYC region, and Chicagoland are all cold weather regions that cover their freeway embankments with evergreen conifers. This helps uplift the mood of long grey winters, and reflects the bloom of summer, as it soften up the otherwise hard and ugly appearance of freeways.

There hasn't been trees planted on the freeway embankments in Detroit for decades. That also goes for major roads in the metro, such as Southfield and Ford Road, etc.

It's going to get really depressing when the new bridge opens. Expect a long, hard mixing bowl of brutal and broken concrete, fit for an opening into hell, absent of any signs of nature.

**stasu1213** · January-16-23, 04:14 PM

Improvements should be made in the merging lanes of most of the freeways that runs through the city of Detroit. Lodge merging into I94 northbound could be dangerous and cause accidents by drivers whom don’t know how to correctly merge onto that part. Also I94 has some of the most worse merging lanes on the east side especially when motorist merges onto the freeway at a snell’s pace instead of at a pace that blend in with the speed of traffic

**ShadowSoarer** · January-16-23, 05:00 PM

Was wondering how does so much trash accumulate on the side of the highways? Is it from drivers or wind that pushes trash from illegal dumping or from dumpsters? Haven’t really noticed that from other metro areas or maybe I haven’t really paid much attention to that.

**Henry Whalley** · January-16-23, 08:38 PM

Originally Posted by ShadowSoarer

Was wondering how does so much trash accumulate on the side of the highways?

Local scofflaws? AFAIK Michigan State Police patrol the freeways. And perhaps they don't bother to ticket litterers when one block away there's a drive-by shooting, carjacking, abduction, etc.?

It's part of the local ambience not seen in many communities. Probably the real estate magnates who own green zone have ordered the mayor to address this blight at the gates of their urban theme park?

**Henry Whalley** · January-16-23, 08:45 PM

Originally Posted by 401don

Do they still use prison work crews for that? Seems like it's a win-win for non violent offenders to offer a lighter sentence for community work.

Dunno? But nothing is free unless you're Ilitch, Gilbert, etc. Somebody else will pay for the logistics of deploying corvée labor.

**expatriate** · January-17-23, 11:45 AM

I suspect that the trench design of our freeways make them natural collectors of trash regardless of it's origin. The chain link fencing on the parameters doesn't help by catching every plastic bag that tries to escape.

**Henry Whalley** · January-17-23, 12:53 PM

Originally Posted by expatriate

I suspect that the trench design of our freeways make them natural collectors of trash regardless of it's origin.

That would be easy to verify by looking at other freeways of similar design.

**Cincinnati_Kid** · January-17-23, 01:16 PM

I remember when I was a kid growing up in the 60's, they kept the freeways mowed, clean, and impecable. I also remember when they cleaned every street with those street cleaning trucks. What happened for that to be taken out of the city budget? They should still be doing those things.

**kuuma** · January-18-23, 10:12 AM

honestly good on Duggan for taking the initiative, but at the end of the day it's more MDOT negligence someone else has to clean up.

i've only been in Detroit for a few years so I don't fully know why, but it seems our transportation authority is really a doer of the bare minimum, and not good for much besides widening highways and forgetting nonmotorized methods of transportation exist.

**ShadowSoarer** · January-18-23, 10:58 AM

Detroit responsible for freeway cleaning after $650K deal with MDOT

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P094Fn99lww

Looks like there is a $650K deal to let Detroit cleaning up the freeways instead of MDOT. This might be good considering that MDOT can barely maintain our roads [[granted Detroit might not be much better but roads are getting better). Hopefully Detroit’s freeway cleanup become more permanent rather than just because the NFL Draft is coming up.

Also might as well let Detroit handle the design of the I-375 removal instead of MDOT since they want to make the proposed boulevard so wide.

**Richard** · January-19-23, 01:51 AM

Originally Posted by Cincinnati_Kid

I remember when I was a kid growing up in the 60's, they kept the freeways mowed, clean, and impecable. I also remember when they cleaned every street with those street cleaning trucks. What happened for that to be taken out of the city budget? They should still be doing those things.

I grew up in Minneapolis,same time frame and you never saw trash strewn highways etc,but then came fast food,plastic instead of paper bags,plastic instead of deposit required glass soda bottles and the biggest environmental complaint was cigarette butts that did not decompose.

Budget constraints in the city of Detroit has to be taken into account and it is no consolation but it is like that in the majority of major cities anymore,it was also considered bad to throw trash out but I actually watched somebody sitting next to a cop at a light,50’ from a sign that clearly stated the fine for littering,throw their fast food bag out the window like it was nothing.

**stasu1213** · January-19-23, 03:51 PM

Hire some of those people sitting at the exit ramps to help clean up the entrance and exit ramps of these freeways. The state need to put up more money for that job. Let’s just hope that the money doesn’t go into city general funds and redirected somewhere else while state first time offenders are put to work by cleaning the freeways

**1953** · January-19-23, 04:05 PM

I remember going to Toronto as a kid and seeing that they had sold off sections of the freeway hills to private companies, which landscaped them [['Ford' written in flowers). It always struck me as a decent way to keep things looking nice, where it can be made to work. Maybe we can try that in Detroit.

**401don** · January-19-23, 06:58 PM

Originally Posted by 1953

I remember going to Toronto as a kid and seeing that they had sold off sections of the freeway hills to private companies, which landscaped them [['Ford' written in flowers). It always struck me as a decent way to keep things looking nice, where it can be made to work. Maybe we can try that in Detroit.

They're along the berms that separate Hwy 401 from the airport and along the QEW as you approach downtown. Not that you're old, but I can't believe you saw them as a kid. I still consider them a fairly recent development. It's always been in greenery rather than flowers as far as I know. Not sure how much revenue it generates but it's not a bad idea.

**ABetterDetroit** · January-19-23, 09:23 PM

Originally Posted by Henry Whalley

Dunno? But nothing is free unless you're Ilitch, Gilbert, etc. Somebody else will pay for the logistics of deploying corvée labor.

Thank you for connecting the obvious dots. If one wants the lowest cost to the taxpayer for incarceration per head… No Field Trips.

**Gistok** · January-19-23, 10:53 PM

When I was a kid, I remember the grassy slopes on the side of the freeways were nicely manicured with frequent cutting. Then later the state widened the shoulder for more space for car breakdowns. But in doing so, they increased the angle of the grassy slope, and cutting after rain showers caused erosion of the grass. And in the last 20 years the mowing of the grass has been greatly reduced, meaning that after the grass has been cut, the clippings are easy to spot as long yellow cuttings on top of the grass, along the freeway... making it look very trashy.

Just removing litter off of the sides of the freeway doesn't improve the look of the freeways as much as if maintenance improvements were included...

**1953** · January-20-23, 02:29 PM

Originally Posted by 401don

They're along the berms that separate Hwy 401 from the airport and along the QEW as you approach downtown. Not that you're old, but I can't believe you saw them as a kid. I still consider them a fairly recent development. It's always been in greenery rather than flowers as far as I know. Not sure how much revenue it generates but it's not a bad idea.

Not to give away too much, but I saw them 29 years ago, when I was 12. Not sure if it was the same installation that is there today or not.

1953

**401don** · January-20-23, 03:16 PM

Originally Posted by 1953

Not to give away too much, but I saw them 29 years ago, when I was 12. Not sure if it was the same installation that is there today or not.

1953

Okay, so you are just a kid. I wrongly assumed 1953 was your birth date!

**1953** · January-24-23, 03:13 PM

Originally Posted by 401don

Okay, so you are just a kid. I wrongly assumed 1953 was your birth date!

Ha! 1953 is the estimated year of Detroit's peak population!

1953

**preserve** · January-25-23, 12:24 PM

Even when - and not often - the folks soliciting funds on the entrance and exit ramps do clean up their areas and bag it G FL or whoever has that route do not pick up the bags and then they are torn open by wild life and get to start a whole new life.