Quote Originally Posted by Gistok View Post
Isn't half of Florida gated like this during the off season?
Yeah and they are there because they are first and foremost, hurricane shutters. My family has them on their house in florida... they did not put them up to keep out burglars.

People do need to get off the "it looks like Detroit" mindset. In Europe, many residential property has this type of gating on the homes.
I disagree. Municipalities can set whatever guides they want on what they will allow. Roll down blast doors are not typical nor deemed particularly aesthetically pleasing. Further, IN THIS REGION - ignoring the "they do it elsewhere" defense - shutters of this nature telegraph to the populace that there is a crime problem.

I could understand the uproar over the "accordion" "X" gates... but really these are sleek and clean looking...

Let me guess... they probably have ordinances against Armor Guard front and side doors as well?

If there is no ordinance on the books in Royal Oak and they put one out there... this place should either be grandfathered, or reimbursed for the $25K expenses at NOT having gone against an ordinance.
Agreed. a) they could have put up something far less clean; b) if there is no ordinance, RO is blowing smoke.

But again, ala the Broken Windows theory... if you allow this exception... there will be more people with them. And if it's in response to a REAL threat [[regular break-ins after hours in Downtown RO) and not perceived threat [[ooh, i'm close to Detroit, I saw some black people outside my store late at night and I think I will be robbed) that is addressing the wrong end of the problem. If there is a rash of break ins in RO that require businesses to build fortresses, then the RO and ROPD have some explaining to do. They need to spend less time handing out MIPs and nickle dime pot arrests and focus real crime.