What Dateline didn't show..

[Ragtoplover59]

It seems to be common for the people still living in Detroit , to be over sensitive about what is shown to the rest of the country about Detroit.
I really don't think these fears are realistic, The only people that take notice when a show is about Detroit are the people [[ten's of thousands of us) who have lived there before. Not the millions of people [[other than a handful) who have no connection to Detroit.

Detroit is special to us, But it means nothing to the guy who was born and raised in some city more than 300 miles away.
Think about when the steel mill's closed in PA, Did anyone in the "D" get worried that Pittsburgh was going through a bad time, or if something needed to be done to insure that everyone would be just fine, or even stay there?
Detroit is not the only city with empty factories and shuttered plants.

http://www.coalcampusa.com/rustbelt/pa/pa.htm

The "Dateline" story was something I looked forward to seeing, But nobody in my neighborhood, or my work place watched, It didn't apply to them.

How many Detroiters know how many Teachers were layed off in California this year....Me either? I tend to only worry about my location, we have too many problems close to home., I can't wrap my mind around problems in areas I have no vested interests in.
Just like I'm not glued to the TV every time another brush starts in California. To me , it's just a fire...Put it Out? But to the people being affected, It's Everything!

As far as Crime, Murder, Drugs, Gangs, Carjackings, Graffiti, Etc: It's all over the country. How about City leaders who get more for themselves than they do for their cities.....
well OK, that is one issue that can't be denied. Kwame will go down in history as famous or well known as any Motown star.could ever have hoped for. But only on the same level as that Mayor in DC who was busted smokin crack, I don't recall his name.....It didn't apply to me?

But as far as the everyday, "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly", Many Cities are facing the same problem, How many of them are you aware of?

[Al Publican]

I have traveled all over East Asia from Singapore to Seoul, and every where I see small businesses occupying store fronts. Not so in City of Detroit where the two main industries are church and government.

I was hoping that NBC Dateline would have cited Detroit's lack of a small business class as the one of the primary reasons for its lack of prosperity. Of course, to make small businesses succeed a stable family structure is of great help.

Detroit will never rebound until it has males that are willing to remain with women and people that are willing to spend eight hours-plus a day as business owners. Dateline should have dropped that in its commentary.

[R8RBOB]

It seems to be common for the people still living in Detroit , to be over sensitive about what is shown to the rest of the country about Detroit.
I really don't think these fears are realistic, The only people that take notice when a show is about Detroit are the people [[ten's of thousands of us) who have lived there before. Not the millions of people [[other than a handful) who have no connection to Detroit.

Detroit is special to us, But it means nothing to the guy who was born and raised in some city more than 300 miles away.
Think about when the steel mill's closed in PA, Did anyone in the "D" get worried that Pittsburgh was going through a bad time, or if something needed to be done to insure that everyone would be just fine, or even stay there?
Detroit is not the only city with empty factories and shuttered plants.

http://www.coalcampusa.com/rustbelt/pa/pa.htm

The "Dateline" story was something I looked forward to seeing, But nobody in my neighborhood, or my work place watched, It didn't apply to them.

How many Detroiters know how many Teachers were layed off in California this year....Me either? I tend to only worry about my location, we have too many problems close to home., I can't wrap my mind around problems in areas I have no vested interests in.
Just like I'm not glued to the TV every time another brush starts in California. To me , it's just a fire...Put it Out? But to the people being affected, It's Everything!

As far as Crime, Murder, Drugs, Gangs, Carjackings, Graffiti, Etc: It's all over the country. How about City leaders who get more for themselves than they do for their cities.....
well OK, that is one issue that can't be denied. Kwame will go down in history as famous or well known as any Motown star.could ever have hoped for. But only on the same level as that Mayor in DC who was busted smokin crack, I don't recall his name.....It didn't apply to me?

But as far as the everyday, "The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly", Many Cities are facing the same problem, How many of them are you aware of?

I had to read your post three times to get your points and I got them but you have to understand that this was not a 2 minute piece on the 5 o'clock news. This was an hour long story [[minus the commercials) telling the viewers about a city, an old city [[309 years old) that's older that the United States itself, a city that once was a major industrial base for the country, a city that has fallen.

You are correct that there are other cities that are going through their hard times. No doubt!!! But today the story is about Detroit. If Dateline wants to do a story about Cleveland I will watch that too.

You are right when you say millions of people don't care about the events in Detroit but that is what shows like Dateline are for. Detroit don't need millions of people to take an interest. All they need is one. One to start talking and they others to start talking and so on and so on. Other cities need to look at the warning signs and shows like Dateline can serve a purpose.

People like Sheffield want to complain about the negative attention the city got but they are complaining only because their lack of involvement is exposed and now they want Hansen to show the good areas to validate that they are making a difference.

To finish you ended your remarks that most cities are facing the same problems. You are so right. When I lived in the Bay Area, the same things said about Detroit are said about Oakland, San Francisco and San Jose. When I read comments from the children of the Free Press I laugh when they said such silly things like "Detroit is a toliet" or "Detroit is the worst city in the country" or "who wants to move to Detroit." Go anywhere else and the same things are said about said city. But on DetroitYes we are talking about Detroit. Talking about other cities is splitting hairs, yes.

[DC48080]

Detroit will never rebound until it has males that are willing to remain with women and people that are willing to spend eight hours-plus a day as business owners.

^ And add to that people who value going to school and getting an education more than just hanging out on the street corner. People who don't trash their own neighborhoods. People who instill morals and good character in their children

[Bearinabox]

I have traveled all over East Asia from Singapore to Seoul, and every where I see small businesses occupying store fronts. Not so in City of Detroit where the two main industries are church and government.

I was hoping that NBC Dateline would have cited Detroit's lack of a small business class as the one of the primary reasons for its lack of prosperity. Of course, to make small businesses succeed a stable family structure is of great help.

Detroit will never rebound until it has males that are willing to remain with women and people that are willing to spend eight hours-plus a day as business owners. Dateline should have dropped that in its commentary.

The lack of neighborhood retail in the city can be chalked up to all manner of things, but I think one major issue is that we view shopping in terms of hopping in a car and driving to Wal-Mart. A little storefront at the end of the street without a giant parking lot in front doesn't stand much of a chance. Shopping on foot and by bike [[and making smaller trips more frequently for things like groceries) needs to become more of a mainstream idea if we're going to try to cultivate a small business class. The observation has been made on here more than once that even the nicer city neighborhoods tend to have commercial arteries lined with bombed-out ruins; if we want to change that, we need to figure out how to get residents of those neighborhoods to buy things in the neighborhood. There's no reason for, say, 7/Livernois to look as rough as it does--the surrounding residential area is quite stable and middle-class, and there's plenty of economic power to be harnessed there. People just need to have a different mindset.

[DC48080]

The lack of neighborhood retail in the city can be chalked up to all manner of things, but I think one major issue is that we view shopping in terms of hopping in a car and driving to Wal-Mart. A little storefront at the end of the street without a giant parking lot in front doesn't stand much of a chance. Shopping on foot and by bike [[and making smaller trips more frequently for things like groceries) needs to become more of a mainstream idea if we're going to try to cultivate a small business class.

That all sounds like a nice idea and it would be great if there were little neighborhood food markets, but in today's world when both husband and wife work, or if you're single and working 50 some hours a week, there just isn't time to go shopping for groceries several times per week. People like to make one big trip once a week or every two weeks to Kroger, and once every month or two moths to places like Costco for what they need.

And it still doesn't address one of the major the underlying reasons why there isn't more retail in the city: theft and other crime. Store owners are not going to set up shop in an area where the losses from theft and vandalism eat up the profits.

[Bearinabox]

That all sounds like a nice idea and it would be great if there were little neighborhood food markets, but in today's world when both husband and wife work, or if you're single and working 50 some hours a week, there just isn't time to go shopping for groceries several times per week. People like to make one big trip once a week or every two weeks to Kroger, and once every month or two moths to places like Costco for what they need.

Grocery shopping itself takes maybe twenty minutes. Walking two blocks to the store takes maybe five each way. Anyone who doesn't have a spare half hour two or three days a week has much bigger problems than where they get their groceries. I don't buy that "that's just the way the world is now"--it's a question of how people think.

And it still doesn't address one of the major the underlying reasons why there isn't more retail in the city: theft and other crime. Store owners are not going to set up shop in an area where the losses from theft and vandalism eat up the profits.

There are all manner of reasons why we don't have much neighborhood retail; I pointed out one, that is certainly another.

[DC48080]

Grocery shopping itself takes maybe twenty minutes. Walking two blocks to the store takes maybe five each way. Anyone who doesn't have a spare half hour two or three days a week has much bigger problems than where they get their groceries. I don't buy that "that's just the way the world is now"--it's a question of how people think.

That just doesn't work for a large number of people out there. Many people would rather spend that extra half hour three days a week with their kids.

I would rather spend 45 minutes once every week or two doing my shopping on a Sunday afternoon than having to stop on the way home after working 10 hours when I am exhausted.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one.

[Ragtoplover59]

I think in some respects, The shopping at the corner store so often has been has been fazed out, because we now buy food that lasts longer, once we get it home?
We buy packaged meats that are sealed and safe for extended storage, compared to when we would go to the neighborhood mkt, and come home with meat wrapped in paper.
We have conditioned ourselves to store larger amounts of food, doing away with the need to pick up something for dinner each day?
The corner store owner, could go under, waiting for us to come back.

Progress has taken away our simple way of life.

Much in the same way Air Conditioners have had a hand in everyone not spending the afternoon on the porch talking and sharing time with their neighbor.
We used to know what the next door neighbor liked to watch or listen to, on a Saturday night, Now we hardly even know his name?

People used to meet at the movies, or a dance, or a sporting event? Now we stay home and play wii

You would have a good relationship with your favorite Mechanic, Your car would be in to see him every few thousand miles for service, Now cars have no service for more than 100k miles, When something goes wrong now, we don't know who to take it to? Our favorite neighborhood mechanic, and his corner gas station, have been long gone.

We looked forward to progress and the future back then, are we happy with it now?

[lilpup]

The lack of neighborhood retail in the city can be chalked up to all manner of things, but I think one major issue is that we view shopping in terms of hopping in a car and driving to Wal-Mart. A little storefront at the end of the street without a giant parking lot in front doesn't stand much of a chance. Shopping on foot and by bike [[and making smaller trips more frequently for things like groceries) needs to become more of a mainstream idea if we're going to try to cultivate a small business class. The observation has been made on here more than once that even the nicer city neighborhoods tend to have commercial arteries lined with bombed-out ruins; if we want to change that, we need to figure out how to get residents of those neighborhoods to buy things in the neighborhood. There's no reason for, say, 7/Livernois to look as rough as it does--the surrounding residential area is quite stable and middle-class, and there's plenty of economic power to be harnessed there. People just need to have a different mindset.

This is the primary failing of modern urban planning. Neighborhood stores are zoned out of existence and smaller stores that try to compete with the majors in modern retail settings tend to get crushed simply because they don't have the funding to play the game. So many people point to NYC and Chicago while chanting "mass transit" while totally ignoring the fact that the thriving areas of those cities are walkable neighborhoods with local shopping. Detroit could go a long way by just reducing the number of package liquor licenses while encouraging small neighborhood markets to provide staple goods.

I don't know if the city has legal authority to do this but what if the city took over liquor distribution via a small handful of city run [[or contracted) stores that sell nothing else [[the way some states do it)? Then the small stores that really want to service their neighborhoods can concentrate on that instead of dealing with liquor-related issues [[lay out of $$, break-ins for booze, intimidating gauntlets of loiterers, etc.). Those who would drive out of the city to shop at a combo liquor-food store are probably not shopping in the city as it is.

[Bearinabox]

That just doesn't work for a large number of people out there. Many people would rather spend that extra half hour three days a week with their kids.

I would rather spend 45 minutes once every week or two doing my shopping on a Sunday afternoon than having to stop on the way home after working 10 hours when I am exhausted.

We'll have to agree to disagree on this one.

Again, that's a how-people-think problem, not a how-people-live problem, and unless you walk to work, it isn't a problem that "stopping on the way home" will solve.

[DC48080]

Again, that's a how-people-think problem, not a how-people-live problem, and unless you walk to work, it isn't a problem that "stopping on the way home" will solve.

Different strokes for different folks.

[Whitehouse]

Off-topic.

Since the Freep only lets their articles remain online for a limited ammount of time, I tend to lose the context when reading this post at a later date. The original reason for starting this thread is gone, or at least not available anymore. So in case someone is reading this post a few months from now, here's a screenshot of the printable version.

[LL Cool D]

Detroit will never rebound until it has males that are willing to remain with women ...

Detroit has too many houses, and too few people, yet at the same time, too many people, and too few jobs. Everything is phase-lagged with the main drivers of the decline: white flight may have temporarily emptied the houses, but if the UAW hadn't killed the jobs, the houses would have been refilled by blacks.

Which would not have cured racism, but maybe at least reduced it to an abstract moral issue, rather than an immediately-imperative economic one. And such an outcome would have been a huge improvement over the current state of affairs.

[casscorridor]

If you hate the situation in Detroit, you probably hate capitalism.

Capitalism carries an ideology, not just an economic system, it gives a set of morals and values, and the moral foundation of capitalism is "sink or swim." Detroit is a product of capitalism, and if you hate the situation you should also hate capitalism.

But the capitalists will tell you that all Detroit needs is for people to work harder and for males to be the head of the household.

They'll tell us schools work better in the hands of the market and private companies than the hands of the citizens themselves and the educators the y choose to constitute.

Capitalism is a barbaric system. There is an old saying, "good guys finish last"... a more apt description is garbage rises. So it makes sense that history can be rewriten so that the unions are really the source of Detroits problems, beacuse they wanted to work a five day work week, or because they wanted health care and pensions, beacuse they wanted a few extra dollars. They simply wanted to reap the fruits of their labor, and for their fellow workers as well, and expand their quality of life to everybody.... but this is conter to capitalist logic of good guys finish last and sink or swim.

The unions never sought to replace capitalism, only to share in the benifits. This is impossible to attain and so long as there is capitalism there will the impoverished and there will be ultra rich. Only theough creating a fundementaly new system can Detroit become what it ought to.

It is happening from the ground up, very slowly. The media wont cover it. Soon there will be dozens of worker owned cooperatives around the city, that will federate and work outside market capitalism. The foundation of a new economy can start within the ashes of Detroit. A new city, and a new world will rise again.

[sumas]

I did not watch Dateline.

Do not need to see more negatives about this city. I live here and I love it. I get to see an incredable cross section of people and cultural distinctions. Lots of people eat pheasant now. I know how they trap them. Coon is a new one to me. But why not?

I see and meet amazing people every day. Used to do mega volunteer work but am leaving it to younger folk these days and these young folk are stepping up to the plate.

Detroit currently is very fragmented. But even the poorest areas have history and wonderful people.

So let the media take their cheap shots. I know a very different Detroit!

I celebrate our diversity. Tried a few burbs in my day but hated it. Detroit is real and maybe even raw. It is just simply my home town.

[Meddle]

That just doesn't work for a large number of people out there. Many people would rather spend that extra half hour three days a week with their kids.

That's assuming they know who [[ or where ) their kids are.

[softailrider]

That all sounds like a nice idea and it would be great if there were little neighborhood food markets, but in today's world when both husband and wife work, or if you're single and working 50 some hours a week, there just isn't time to go shopping for groceries several times per week. People like to make one big trip once a week or every two weeks to Kroger, and once every month or two moths to places like Costco for what they need.

And it still doesn't address one of the major the underlying reasons why there isn't more retail in the city: theft and other crime. Store owners are not going to set up shop in an area where the losses from theft and vandalism eat up the profits.

Your last sentence said a lot, you reach a pont of where it's just not worth going to work. Store owners are in business to make money - not out of a love for humanity.

[DC48080]

Your last sentence said a lot, you reach a pont of where it's just not worth going to work. Store owners are in business to make money - not out of a love for humanity.

Exactly! You and I go to work every day to put a roof over our heads and to feed our families. Store owners do the same thing. They are not a charity.

If profits cannot be made there will be no stores. There is nothing wrong with that.

[Bearinabox]

There is nothing wrong with that.

Unless, you know, you're a person who wants to buy stuff. Then having no stores presents something of a problem.

[DC48080]

Unless, you know, you're a person who wants to buy stuff. Then having no stores presents something of a problem.

So a shopkeeper should just stay put and put up with excessive levels of theft and vandalism and not make money with which to feed his family?

[Bearinabox]

So a shopkeeper should just stay put and put up with excessive levels of theft and vandalism and not make money with which to feed his family?

That is not what I said.

[DC48080]

Then what is the solution?

[Bearinabox]

Then what is the solution?

Are you asking me to fix Detroit in five minutes on an Internet message board? You said "there's nothing wrong with" not having stores, I'm saying it's a real problem and there definitely is something wrong with it. That doesn't mean I know how to solve it.

[DC48080]

Are you asking me to fix Detroit in five minutes on an Internet message board? You said "there's nothing wrong with" not having stores, I'm saying it's a real problem and there definitely is something wrong with it. That doesn't mean I know how to solve it.

No, I'm not asking you to fix things.

You said "Unless, you know, you're a person who wants to buy stuff. Then having no stores presents something of a problem. " And I pointed out that there is nothing wrong with businessmen not wanting to set up shop in high crime areas. They are not in the business of charity.

People bitch and moan that there isn't this or that retail in the city while ignoring the factors that keep buisnesses out of the city.