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Originally Posted by PhillyRising
I can't say what has gone on or not gone on in Detroit since the 1950's..but Philadelphia was changing for the good and bad. First it started with ousting the hopelessly corrupt Republican machine that let the city slide backwards since the Depression. The city government was reformed and professionals were now put in city offices that were basically bastions of nepotism for years. Sure yeah, the Democrats wound up be somewhat corrupt to over the years but it has never come as close as the corruption of the old Republican machine.
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Re: the mayor, there was a similar situation in Detroit. A lot of the urban renewal projects that began the destruction in Detroit were pushed through by a Republican mayor in an almost authoritative fashion.
I think a really key difference between Philadelphia and Detroit was the presence of a strong universities in the city of Philadelphia. Philadelphia has Penn, Temple, and Drexel right there in the heart of the city, which were strong forces to stabilize the core. Detroit's universities are all mostly commuter schools, and only Wayne State is located near the core of the city. If the University of Michigan was still in Detroit, and not 40 miles down the road, it would have been a strong force to stabilize the city's population.