Quote Originally Posted by Mackinaw View Post
Sadly, much of the Woodward-adjacent land toward the bottom of Midtown has been totally cleared and is now packaged as big blocks, in much the same way that most urban renewal products have proceeded.
For some reason there seems to be a continuing preference in Detroit for the superblock, closed off, model of redevelopment that is essentially made up of cul-de-sacs leading to townhouses around a parking lot. You see it in everything from older developments like Lafayette and Elmwood Parks to almost brand-new ones like Woodbridge Estates. And I'd bet that's what Detroit's wizard urban planners have in mind for that south Midtown area [[well, that and maybe Illitch's new arena along with the parking fields for it).

This seems both terribly out-moded and anti-urban at the same time. Around here it's almost as if Jane Jacobs and all of the people who followed her never lived, or that their work had never reached our remote part of the world. In my mind it all goes back to my long-time contention that most people in this area aren't particularly interested in urban settings or a vibrant urban life, and in fact don't really care for city living at all.