Historic Townships of Oakland County

[Mikeg]

Detroit was finally "reined in" by an orgy of incorporation, as developed areas in the townships outside Detroit made themselves cities -- resulting in today's clusterfuck of 100-odd governments competing with each other and duplicating services. But at least they kept Detroit from growin', huh?

The truth is that Detroit's frantic pace of expansion and annexation from 1910 to 1926 was finally "reined in" by the Great Depression and Detroit's own water, sewer and transit policies. The last annexations happened in 1926, just before the stock market crash and the onset of the Great Depression. In return for annexation, the city had to provide certain services, such a police, fire, water, sewer, roads, transit, etc. Unfortunately, the city was right in the middle of expanding the capital-intensive services to keep up with those last annexations when the Great Depression hit.

Excerpts from "Detroit Water and Sewage Department - the First 300 Years"

The Solution To Pollution Is Not Dilution

...... The U.S. and Great Britain signed the Waterways Treaty on January 11, 1909. The pact recognized pollution as an international problem, and provided that boundary waters between the United States and Canada, or waters crossing the boundary "shall not be polluted on either side to the injury of health or property on the other." It foreshadowed the necessity for remedial measures and is considered the genesis of DWSD's Wastewater Treatment Plant.

Meanwhile, yearly typhoid epidemics reached a high point in 1912, prompting the U.S. Public Health service to mandate the disinfection of all water distributed to the Department's customers. Calcium hypochlorite was first used in 1913. It was replaced in 1916 by liquid chlorine, a more effective disinfectant. Disinfection had a dramatic impact. Typhoid deaths in Detroit reached a rate of 25 for every 100,000 people during the year prior to the introduction of liquid chlorine. The following year's death rate fell to less than half that amount, approximately 10 for every 100,000 people. Illness from waterborne organisms became negligible after the implementation of 24-hour monitoring of water quality by degreed chemists in 1917.

Because disinfection of drinking water was not considered a complete answer to water treatment, the first segment of the Detroit River Interceptor [[DRI) was built in 1912. The DRI intercepted sewage and discharged it below the system intake. At that time, the Department made plans to build the filtration plant in Water Works Park. In the meantime, an exhibit was set up near the Hurlbut Memorial Gate on East Jefferson where Detroiters were invited to compare filtered and unfiltered samples of drinking water. The clear filtered water was the hands-down choice over the off-colored, unfiltered samples. On December 2, 1923, the Department formally opened the largest filtration plant in the world...........

By the end of the '20s, the practice of channeling untreated wastewater into the river could no longer be tolerated. Pollution was exacerbated by Detroit's frantic pace of expansion and annexation from 1910-1926. The city was flirting with the one-million population mark while the auto industry roared. The Detroit Board of Water Commissioners [[BOWC) addressed the need for more treated water - created by development and annexation - in 1924 by authorizing construction of the Springwells Water Treatment Plant at an estimated $30 million. When fully completed in 1935, it was the largest self-contained water plant in the world; adding about 300 MGD to the overall system capacity.

After entering service, it was known for a short time as "the White Elephant of Springwells Street." The unflattering sobriquet was bestowed by those who perceived the plant's vast size as a wasteful and extravagant expression of a bygone era......

In 1925, the BOWC gave the go-ahead for construction of the Wastewater Treatment Plant - at the confluence of the Rouge and Detroit rivers - to deal with the flood of wastewater created by Detroit's industrial and urban development and a growing number of requests for additional services from suburban communities. Unfortunately, economic conditions created by the Great Depression halted construction in 1932. Construction would not start up again until 1936, after an infusion of money from President Franklin D. Roosevelt's Public Works Administration. That $20 million allowed the Department to not only complete plant construction,but provided enough to finance the extension of the DRI to the treatment plant.

The Wastewater Treatment Plant entered service in February 1940 at a cost of $22,635,000 [[more than half spent to complete the DRI and the network of connecting mains). It was designed to provide primary treatment for 2.4 million people in Detroit, Gratiot Township [[Harper Woods), Grosse Pointe City, Grosse Pointe Farms, Grosse Pointe Park, Grosse Pointe Woods, Hamtramck, Highland Park, Redford Township, St. Clair Shores, Southfield Township and Warren Township. With modifications, the plant was expected to service the needs of a population of four million......

A 1935 city ordinance required the cost of operations and debt repayment [[$1,392,543 during the first 12 months) be raised by supplemental charges added to every bill issued by the BOWC. Detroiters paid 11 cents per thousand cubic feet of water and suburban communities paid an extra 21.61 cents per thousand cubic feet.

Post-war Development

When normal economic development returned after the end of World War II, new homes were often connected to lateral sewer mains laid in the 1920s because of a decline in new home construction during the Depression. The Great Depression also caused the brakes to be applied to the BOWC's liberal expansionist policy. L.G. Lenhardt - General Manager beginning in 1938 - was a product of the era's cautious approach to development. He held the Department to a course that mirrored Detroit's near-saturated state of development and proclaimed that the Department would concern itself with only taking care of what it already had. He advocated entry into the water and sewerage business by other government bodies - Wayne County, in particular - to serve needs created by suburban development.

The Department's conservative management style was radically transformed in 1956 with the arrival of Gerald J. Remus, the new Superintendent and Chief Engineer. Remus believed Detroit was up to the task of filling the role of water and wastewater services provider for the whole of metro Detroit. Under his direction, the Department returned to a policy of expansion with an aggression not seen since the end of the 19th century.......

However, by then the "window of opportunity" for annexing additional surrounding communities had long since been slammed shut. Instead, the DWSD's new expansionist policy fueled the growth of the suburban cities that had taken root during the DWSD's previous policy of "only taking care of what it already had".

Over on the "Federal Judge to Order a New Management System for DWSD", I found portions of this comment of your's to be factually incorrect:

......Though it wasn't a city department, the Detroit United Railway had tremendous scope 100 years ago, running electric trains on Detroit city streets, and running lines out as far as Jackson, Pontiac, Port Huron, Toledo, even Cleveland. Due to a boom in road-building subsidies in the 1910s, their profitability declined, but Detroit inherited the city system and ran it for some time. Unfortunately, with the city only running the rail lines within the city, it altered the development of the metroplex forever..

Let me offer an example of how the DSR and the city of Detroit shot itself in the foot with its roadway and transit decisions that caused DSR streetcar service to the Macomb County communities of Baseline, Van Dyke and Center Line to end in 1932:

The Center Line-Harper Streetcar was originally a Detroit United Railway [[DUR) electric interurban line that began service along Van Dyke in 1901. The northern terminus of this line was at the turn-around loop just north of Ten Mile Road. The southern end of this DUR line was at the intersection of Van Dyke and Harper Avenues in Detroit. From there, the southbound traveler would transfer to the Harper Line of the Detroit Street Railways [[DSR) which ended at Cadillac Square in downtown Detroit. In 1922, this DUR line was acquired by the DSR, which continued the operation with more modern streetcar equipment.

The line had a short stretch of double track at Nine Mile Road and was completely double-tracked south of Seven Mile Road. A decision by the city of Detroit to widen Van Dyke in 1932 caused the DSR streetcar service north of Seven Mile Road to be replaced by a shuttle bus. During the widening, the line was double-tracked all the way to Eight Mile Road and upon completion of the project in 1934, Eight Mile Road became the northern terminus of this streetcar line.

My parents remember riding the streetcar with their parents from their home in Center Line to downtown Detroit and back. They have no memories of riding that shuttle bus to go shopping in Detroit.

[Detroitnerd]

Now, if the city had used its bonding power to build a subway instead of purchase the tracks of the DUR ...

Well, hindsight is always 20-20 ...

[Novine]

Oakland County includes all or part of 62 townships, villages and cities. Most of the annexation and incorporation battles in Oakland County occurred within the county as existing villages and cities attempted to expand into the surrounding townships. In only a couple of cases did a village or city expand across county lines into Oakland County [[Northville and Fenton).

Several of the county's largest cities were formed when townships incorporated to fend off annexation efforts. Examples include the incorporation of Troy Township into the City of Troy, Avon Township into Rochester Hills, Pontiac Township into Auburn Hills, the incorporation of Farmington Township into Farmington Hills [[including two existing villages) and the incorporation of most of Novi Township into the Village of Novi and then the City of Novi.

A number of communities incorporated to preserve their identity including Huntington Woods, Lake Angelus and the City of the Village of Clarkston. The villages north of the City of Southfield [[Franklin, Bingham Farms and Beverly Hills) all incorporated to avoid being included within the boundaries of the future City of Southfield which was being incorporated from Southfield Township.

Some incorporated for economic reasons like Northville which changed from village to city status to capture revenues from Northville Downs and Wixom which incorporated first as a village and then as a city to capture the tax revenues from the Ford plant which was being built in that portion of Novi Township.

The most recent annexations in Oakland County were from Lyon Township to the City of South Lyon and from Holly Township to the City of Fenton and from Bloomfield Township to the City of Pontiac which is now the site of the massive abandoned development near Telegraph and Square Lake Roads. According to state records, Auburn Hills annexed a small parcel in Pontiac in 2010. That must have been a land transfer between the two cities approved by both city councils. South Lyon also recently transferred some land back to Lyon Township.

[Danny]

Here's what happen why Pontiac miss its chance to become a proposed mega-opolis like Detroit or Flint:

In 1818 Colonel Stephen Mack arrived to area filled with 1,000 lakes. He built an settlement and called it his place "Auburn" after Auburn, New York. He also called it PontiacTownship after Cheif Pontiac who plotted the seige of Fort Detroit from the Brittish during the French-Indian War in 1763. By State legislation Pontiac Township became the county seat and city entity in 1827. When Oakland County was formed in 1818 it only had two large townships. Pontiac and Royal Oak. Both of these townships were a division of 30 x 15 miles. [[ Bigger than present day Detroit, but with little or no human population.) Later as new Oakland County townships formed. Pontiac Township was downsized to 6 X 6 mile area. As settlers came and towns were developed. Residents voted to parts of Pontiac Township to become a city and it did in 1861. and it annexes fewer pieces of southern portion of Bloomfield Township. The eastern and northern portions remain Pontiac Township.

In the meantime the eastern and northern portions of Pontiac Township became the Village of Auburn 1826. Then name was changed to Amy in 1880. In 1917 the township is renamed ' Auburn Heights ' Later in residents in Auburn Heights worried that Pontiac is attempting to annex the area so they ask Legislators to incorporate as the village of 'Pontiac Heights' but they refused. So by 1978 residents voted for a new 1978 SBC Charter Law and area become as the Charter of Pontiac Township as long as the residents can provide it own water, sewage and town charter public services. By 1983 The Pontiac Township Board failed to provide its own services and Pontiac is going to annex all of that land. So by 1983 residents voted to incorporate as the City of Auburn Hills and it did. Residents who lived at the northern portion of village of Lake Angelus didn't want to join new City of Auburn Hills so they voted to found their City of Lake Angelus in 1984. The Village of Auburn Heights joined in and approves it annexation.

In the meantime Pontiac want to get its hands on all of Bloomfield Township. So its residents rushed to vote to have its township to become a charter that remains today. Other neighboring townships decided to go charter to prevent Pontiac's and other smaller cities to attempt annextion:

Orion, Independence, Oakland and Waterford.

[Detroitnerd]

Well put, Novine.