Cities that belong in other states

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by FromSD

That to me argues against the earlier argument that Detroit decayed so much more than Chicago because it was dominated more by single family houses.

My point about single-family housing was that Detroit hit its peak when it did because it had no room to continue growing. Single-family housing development ate up the land much more quickly than multi-family development would have done. Once the developable land ceiling was hit, the focus shifted from building sfhs in the city limits to building them in the greenfield suburbs, a pattern which has since continued unabated in the Detroit Metro area. The only way the city could have counteracted that would have been by building more mfh in the city to retain more of the middle class.

Originally Posted by FromSD

If you look at the outer boroughs of New York, it was the Bronx that suffered the most decay and depopulation during the city's period of economic decline in the '70s and early '80s. The Bronx was also the outer borough that was most dominated by apartment buildings, with correspondingly fewer single family owner-occupied units.

Both numeric and percentage-wise, Manhattan lost the most population of any borough since 1950. That is due to a combination of no buildable land and declining family sizes. The Bronx experienced a sharp drop in the 1970s, as did 4/5s of the boroughs, but it hasn't had a decline since 1980. The Bronx also recovered to its population peak more quickly than Brooklyn. Queens had a smaller dip than the other boroughs, but it is also the biggest borough by area.

Originally Posted by FromSD

I can understand the argument that single family homes might be more vulnerable to the ravages of fire and water incursion after abandonment--at least compared to sturdier, more substantial apartment buildings. But I've always thought that single family neighborhoods had more staying power, especially when those homes were owner-occupied. The idea that it's easier for a Detroit homeowner to flee to the suburbs for a better version of what they had in the city seems counter-intuitive to me. All a fleeing Detroit renter would need to do is move out of their apartment. A homeowner, on the other hand, has more of a stake in their property, and has to go to the trouble and cost of selling it, possibly incurring a financial loss if property values have gone down.

Detroit's problem isn't really homeowners fleeing. The problem is that there is no demand for the neighborhoods in Detroit after the people that live there inevitably move on. People don't live forever, so a neighborhood has to maintain some demand or it will eventually revert to nature.

Originally Posted by FromSD

I read a long article a few years ago about the particular things in Detroit that made it decline so far. Two things that I still recall: the metro area's lack of a top flight research university (I guess the author didn't think that Wayne State made the grade), and the way the siting of industrial properties in Detroit tended to disrupt and degrade the urban fabric. But to me it's really the regional economy that was the driver, and it would have been the most important thing whether Detroit had a lot of single family housing or not.

Maybe a university would have stabilized a neighborhood, but I don't think that's the smoking gun. Wayne State being a commuter school is probably more symptom of other issues than it is a diagnosis.

[badrunner]

I wonder if there is some kind of subtle geographic or environmental factors that are being overlooked here. Does the weather get slightly nicer as you go north out of Detroit? It certainly gets woodsier and hillier. Are these significant pull factors that can explain the extreme wealth flight and suburbanization? It seems all the favorable geography is to the north of the city. Contrast that to Chicago where the most favorable natural geography is right along the lakefront.

[FromSD]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

My point about single-family housing was that Detroit hit its peak when it did because it had no room to continue growing. Single-family housing development ate up the land much more quickly than multi-family development would have done. Once the developable land ceiling was hit, the focus shifted from building sfhs in the city limits to building them in the greenfield suburbs, a pattern which has since continued unabated in the Detroit Metro area. The only way the city could have counteracted that would have been by building more mfh in the city to retain more of the middle class.

That may help explain why Detroit hit its peak population in 1950, but it doesn't really explain why it suffered so much population loss after that point. Certainly not a 65% loss. The City of Detroit boomed as the US auto industry enjoyed its greatest success in the first half of the 20th century. But the American auto industry began to falter at the very time that Detroit's suburban expansion hit its turbo phase. Detroit's home values and neighborhood viability would suffer from those two things happening at the same time.

[FromSD]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Both numeric and percentage-wise, Manhattan lost the most population of any borough since 1950. That is due to a combination of no buildable land and declining family sizes. The Bronx experienced a sharp drop in the 1970s, as did 4/5s of the boroughs, but it hasn't had a decline since 1980. The Bronx also recovered to its population peak more quickly than Brooklyn. Queens had a smaller dip than the other boroughs, but it is also the biggest borough by area.

I was really focusing on New York's period of economic decline in the '70s and early '80s. Manhattan started losing population after 1910, but I'm sure you'd agree that that decline wasn't primarily due to abandonment or urban decline more generally. In the '70s, the Bronx had the highest pecentage population loss: almost 21% vs. about 14% for Brooklyn, 7% for Manhattan and 5% for Queens. All of the boroughs began growing in population by the 1990 census. Even now the Bronx is the poorest of the boroughs by a fair margin.

[FromSD]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

Maybe a university would have stabilized a neighborhood, but I don't think that's the smoking gun. Wayne State being a commuter school is probably more symptom of other issues than it is a diagnosis.

I think the point about the absence of a world class university has less to do with neighborhood stabilization rather than the university being an economic engine for the regional economy. Stanford and Cal in the Bay Area would serve as the prime example of this. But I doubt that this is among the top 2 or 3 reasons for Detroit's decline. It's just something that sets it apart from most other major US cities. That is unless you count the University of Michigan as part of the Detroit metro.

[Steely Dan]

^ Stanford to downtown San Francisco: 28 miles

Ann arbor to downtown Detroit: 36 miles

Kind of a wash at that point.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by badrunner

I wonder if there is some kind of subtle geographic or environmental factors that are being overlooked here. Does the weather get slightly nicer as you go north out of Detroit? It certainly gets woodsier and hillier. Are these significant pull factors that can explain the extreme wealth flight and suburbanization? It seems all the favorable geography is to the north of the city. Contrast that to Chicago where the most favorable natural geography is right along the lakefront.

The favored quarter of Metro Detroit generally has slightly snowier, colder weather, due to higher elevation. I doubt that plays a role, though. It's basically just a suburban extension of the former favored quarter in Detroit proper.

[Crawford]

Originally Posted by FromSD

I was really focusing on New York's period of economic decline in the '70s and early '80s. Manhattan started losing population after 1910, but I'm sure you'd agree that that decline wasn't primarily due to abandonment or urban decline more generally. In the '70s, the Bronx had the highest pecentage population loss: almost 21% vs. about 14% for Brooklyn, 7% for Manhattan and 5% for Queens. All of the boroughs began growing in population by the 1990 census. Even now the Bronx is the poorest of the boroughs by a fair margin.

The Bronx had somewhat unique characteristics. Yeah, it followed the general postwar decline narrative, but the Bronx has an unusually large number of neighborhoods dominated by large apartment blocks. Most of the Bronx is basically an extension of Upper Manhattan. And that area vacated extremely fast, due to simultaneous Jewish flight. That corridor was the most Jewish place on earth after WW2, and the Jewish population vanished in a few years. The city was concurrently strengthening tenants rights, making it almost impossible to turn a profit on the the new tenant base (poor Puerto Rican and black newcomers, mostly).

The Bronx has since revitalized, but remains poor, bc most of the renovated/new buildings have income/rent restrictions. Much of the Bronx is basically a permanent low income zone, though quite vibrant and rather healthy at this point.

[craigs]

Originally Posted by Steely Dan

^ Stanford to downtown San Francisco: 28 miles

Ann arbor to downtown Detroit: 36 miles

Kind of a wash at that point.

And as the crow flies, UC Berkeley is only 8.5 miles from downtown San Francisco. Stanford has traditionally fueled that region's tech industry, but Berkeley has nurtured San Francisco's overall economy much more. In SF, you can't throw a Shamrock Shake over your shoulder without hitting a Cal grad.

[Velvet_Highground]

Originally Posted by Crawford

The favored quarter of Metro Detroit generally has slightly snowier, colder weather, due to higher elevation. I doubt that plays a role, though. It's basically just a suburban extension of the former favored quarter in Detroit proper.

The favored quarter Metro Detroit is favored due to the very nature that makes it’s slightly colder and snowier. The up to almost 1,000 feet in elevation increase along with thousands of lakes that have open water during the traditional lake effect season help recharge dead or dying bands.

I know this is a stretch to head out but there tends to be a big lake effect band that will drop snow down the 96 corridor, Grand Rapids and Lansing at the farthest usually get anything of note. However the greater arc of northern winds will create lake effect off Superior those already juiced but snowed out winds that blow south over Michigan recharge with an advantage. It also can be argued with proper storm positioning over Lake Huron that the western turn of the winds happens over the fatter southern half of Lake Michigan lessening the impact of my argument.

It’s pretty common to see one big long band form along I-96 and drop up to two inches of snow in the NW burbs that’s lake effect, forget lake enhancement. The slight lift in elevation helps ring out snow at extreme range as well as the thousands of lakes that are open water likely add a tiny bit of extra moisture over Oakland & Livingston Counties.

For reference long dead lake effect bands as clouds rich with moisture hit the Appalachian Mountains in West Virginia most commonly causing an increase in snowfall totals there. In extreme cases the higher North Carolina Appalachian’s can also see a couple inches squeezed out.

Conversely as the traditional old money favored quarter along the coastal plains and shore of Lake St Clair have quite comparatively sheltered conditions by buffering effect of the water during cold blasts. That is until or if the rivers and St Clair get a solid freeze going, making spring cooler on the east side.

Certain botanical enthusiasts grow cold hearty palms such as the Windmill Palm with the help of burlap and wood chips in the winter on the east side outdoors. The average yearly extreme low temperature in the 6b climate zone is similar to the upper south for reference. There is a similar effect along the east coast of Lake Michigan creating the well known cherry and wine county but also makes the a new favorite for growing Giant Sequoia outside of its natural zone for preservation purposes.




https://www.freep.com/story/news/loc...s/71670514007/


Efforts to propagate Sequoia after the success of mature trees planted in the 40’s in Manistee. Chiba fest in Muskegon this year was all about apparently smoking weed listening to music & planting Sequoia in the area.
https://www.ancienttreearchive.org/s...s-in-michigan/

Lake Bluff Bird Sanctuary Sequoia grove.

http://travelthemitten.com/family-tr...s-in-manistee/

While the east coast specifically southern New England has the right temperature zone for Sequoia the Atlantic humidity can cause root rot. The cool waters of Lake Michigan cool the air lowering the maximum humidity content making happy trees.

https://michpics.wordpress.com/2022/...-sequoia-tree/

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by badrunner

I wonder if there is some kind of subtle geographic or environmental factors that are being overlooked here. Does the weather get slightly nicer as you go north out of Detroit? It certainly gets woodsier and hillier. Are these significant pull factors that can explain the extreme wealth flight and suburbanization? It seems all the favorable geography is to the north of the city. Contrast that to Chicago where the most favorable natural geography is right along the lakefront.

No, there aren't really any attractive differentiating geographical features north or west of the city. There are small lakes in Oakland County, but that's about it. The weather also tends to be slightly colder and snowier in Detroit's suburbs, so it wasn't because of a better climate. The city of Detroit, Grosse Pointe, and eastern Macomb County actually have access to the best geographical features in the region because of the riverfront and lakefront, however they have only recently put effort into making the riverfront an attractive destination for people to visit. And a lot of the lakefront access in GP and Macomb is private.

Technically the sprawl went east before it went north, but they ran out of room going east by the 1920s. The city always had to eventually sprawl north because of the shape of the coast, and being limited from sprawling into Ontario by an international border.

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by FromSD

That may help explain why Detroit hit its peak population in 1950, but it doesn't really explain why it suffered so much population loss after that point. Certainly not a 65% loss. The City of Detroit boomed as the US auto industry enjoyed its greatest success in the first half of the 20th century. But the American auto industry began to falter at the very time that Detroit's suburban expansion hit its turbo phase. Detroit's home values and neighborhood viability would suffer from those two things happening at the same time.

I think Detroit's issue is that the region develops more than the population can absorb. The auto industry issues might explain why the population growth slowed, but it doesn't explain why the catastrophic depopulation or the core city happened and is still ongoing after nearly 80 years. The only logical explanation for depopulation is overdevelopment.

[Steely Dan]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I think Detroit's issue is that the region develops more than the population can absorb. The auto industry issues might explain why the population growth slowed, but it doesn't explain why the catastrophic depopulation or the core city happened and is still ongoing after nearly 80 years. The only logical explanation for depopulation is overdevelopment.

Your explanation still seems more "what" than "why" to me.

[benp]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I think Detroit's issue is that the region develops more than the population can absorb. The auto industry issues might explain why the population growth slowed, but it doesn't explain why the catastrophic depopulation or the core city happened and is still ongoing after nearly 80 years. The only logical explanation for depopulation is overdevelopment.

Instead of overdevelopment, how about "obsolescence?" I really hate to use that term, but home design has changed dramatically over the years (extra bathrooms, bigger bedrooms, larger homes in general, etc). Short of tearing inner city homes down and rebuilding from scratch, not all "modern" features could be added to existing homes at any cost, and those that can are costly and not easily done (including difficulty in finding competent builders who specialize in such things). Few people desire to upgrade if the end result is valued at much greater than average neighborhood values, as they would be unlikely to see a return on their investment if sold. The lack of return also impacts desirability of banks to provide loans for upgrades, further inhibiting potential development.

The fact that Detroit built so many homes so quickly in a relative short time span has meant that huge numbers of homes all reached "obsolescence" at roughly the same time, whereas neighborhoods that grew more organically (over years and decades) may be more able to modernize incrementally.

And regarding "the only logical explanation..." don't overlook the elephant in the room, that being White Flight and white fear, in combination with the desirability and economics of living in old neighborhoods of old poorly maintained homes..

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by benp

Instead of overdevelopment, how about "obsolescence?" I really hate to use that term, but home design has changed dramatically over the years (extra bathrooms, bigger bedrooms, larger homes in general, etc). Short of tearing inner city homes down and rebuilding from scratch, not all "modern" features could be added to existing homes at any cost, and those that can are costly and not easily done (including difficulty in finding competent builders who specialize in such things). Few people desire to upgrade if the end result is valued at much greater than average neighborhood values, as they would be unlikely to see a return on their investment if sold. The lack of return also impacts desirability of banks to provide loans for upgrades, further inhibiting potential development.

The fact that Detroit built so many homes so quickly in a relative short time span has meant that huge numbers of homes all reached "obsolescence" at roughly the same time, whereas neighborhoods that grew more organically (over years and decades) may be more able to modernize incrementally.

I think overdevelopment and obsolescence are the same thing. Detroit had the oldest housing stock and infrastructure so it was discarded first, but Detroit has torn down 100s of thousands of homes that were perfectly fine and could have continued to serve the purpose of housing. The only reason so much housing was abandoned is because there were not enough people to live in them. And it's not something that has stopped. At this very moment Detroit is in the process of tearing down hundreds of houses and commercial buildings for just one reason: no one wants them.

Originally Posted by benp

And regarding "the only logical explanation..." don't overlook the elephant in the room, that being White Flight and white fear, in combination with the desirability and economics of living in old neighborhoods of old poorly maintained homes..

White flight and racial tension happened many places. White flight also long ago turned into Black flight, so the issue clearly isn't racial (at least anymore). Detroit is only matched by St. Louis in how severe those cities urban declines have been despite only mild regional population losses compared to some other metro areas.

Worthless land is the core problem in Detroit. The land is worthless because of 1) lack of jobs centralization, and 2) a glut of developed land. There is no centralization of jobs in Detroit as there is in Chicago, so land values do not appreciate as you get closer to the core of the city. There is no land constraint in Detroit like there is in Los Angeles, so it is more economically advantageous for developers to just consume greenfield developments on the periphery than to redevelop brownfields areas.

[iheartthed]

Since we were talking about Detroit's housing and architectural styles, I thought I'd share a photo I saw on Facebook today.



The caption says the photo is from Vernor Highway and taken in 1933. It doesn't give a cross street, but it was likely taken in or near Detroit's Black Bottom neighborhood. Vernor Highway was once a contiguous crosstown route that extended southwest Detroit near the Dearborn border to the Grosse Pointe border on the far east side of Detroit. Today the road has two non-contiguous sections: West Vernor and East Vernor. West Vernor extends from SW Detroit to Michigan Central Station, and East Vernor extends from Gratiot to the Detroit/Grosse Pointe border. The section between the two Vernor sections has been replaced by I-75.

Vernor was widened in the 1930s so these houses might have been lost well before I-75 was constructed, but this architecture was pretty typical for the area of the city just east of downtown before the urban renewal projects. Most of the architecture was wiped for stuff like this, this, this, and this. The street grid was also grossly deformed in this area by the mid-century urban renewal projects, with many streets being disconnected, or taken off the map entirely due to the freeways and super block development planning.

[Velvet_Highground]

Great find I was doing a little bit of research about Ulysses Grant when he was quartermaster of Detroit in the 1840’s including what the neighborhood around “The Grant Home” looked like. My first thoughts of finding images from Lafayette Park before urban renewal were that looks like Corktown.

Residents when asked how they want urban renewal money spent were quoted as saying they liked living in their own homes & would prefer home & neighborhood improvement grants.

U.S. Grant’s home in what’s now Lafayette Park what I can tell is close to or in original state. Neighborhoods went through German, Greek & Jewish hands before in the late 1800’s - 1910 the broader area become majority black.

Grant Home built 1837

https://historicdetroit.org/postcard...ant-house/7000

Grant Home in 1919

https://www.archpaper.com/2020/07/fo...ed-relocation/

An interesting piece to note when thinking about what kind of dichotomy black Michiganders faced when building Black Bottom & Paradise Valley into one of if not the most prosperous in the nation.

In 2006, American legal historian Paul Finkelman released “The Surprising History of Race and Law in Michigan,” in which he argues that Michigan was considerably more progressive towards African Americans than the majority of the nation. Michigan was notably a strong abolitionist state, but Finkelman points out that some cities in Michigan, such as Detroit, were not quick to release prejudices.

Michigan’s initial constitution barred colored Michiganders from voting, and since being a member of a jury was tied to voting rights, colored Michiganders could not serve on juries either. Laws to be enforced on colored citizens, known as “black codes,” in Michigan, were largely dropped in the 1830s, and were loosely enforced even to that point.

Post-Civil War, the Michigan legislature prohibited segregation in public schools, but the city of Detroit refused to follow, and claimed the prohibition did not apply to them, stating that Detroit whites would vehemently refuse to go to the same schools as colored children. Detroit, Michigan’s most populace city, held onto academic racist views into the 1960s that matched those sentiments of deep southern states.

Colored Michiganders were by federal law, unable to vote in general elections. American society and civil liberties were highly based on the right to vote. Foner shared this quote from Frederick Douglass soon after the Civil War, “Slavery is not abolished until the black man has the ballot.” If one cannot vote for those in government, they don’t have a say, they don’t have representation. They’re still ruled. As the American colonists had chanted going into the American Revolution, “Taxation without Representation” was tyranny. The 1867 Michigan legislators understood this, and Finkelman notes that the Michigan 1867 constitutional convention highly supported black suffrage. Michigan voters rejected the 1867 constitution, not particularly because of the black suffrage inclusion, but because of other instances in the new draft. In no fault to racism of Michiganders as a whole, but to other circumstances such as changes to railroad financing government salaries, and liquor prohibition, blacks in Michigan would not yet get the vote. However, it should be pointed out that at the same convention, a 50 to 16 vote shot down making black suffrage a separate election provision.

In 1869, Michigan legislation would finally produce civil rights amendments on their own for Michiganders to vote on. These new amendments offered to eradicate all racial distinctions from the Michigan Constitution and Michigan law. Michigan successfully voted to ratify the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, the 15th Amendment allowing African Americans to vote. Colored Michiganders had made great leaps in the Reconstruction Era, but the Jim Crow Era still laid ahead.

https://www.mininggazette.com/news/f...struction-era/

Heart of Black Bottom 1935-36 Brewster - Douglas construction has begun.

Historic Detroit.org - https://twitter.com/mackaracka/statu...41859281604609

E. Lafayette 1949

https://miesdetroit.org/Black-Bottom

2217 Macomb 1950

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-urban-renewal

1824-1826 Mullett 1949

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-urban-renewal

1231-1235-1239 Riopelle 1949

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-urban-renewal

Hall Coal Co. - 1836 Mullett 1949

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...-urban-renewal

[3rd&Brown]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I think Detroit's issue is that the region develops more than the population can absorb. The auto industry issues might explain why the population growth slowed, but it doesn't explain why the catastrophic depopulation or the core city happened and is still ongoing after nearly 80 years. The only logical explanation for depopulation is overdevelopment.

It's probably this. It also feels like there isn't really a greenbelt or anything in Detroit's suburban counties.

One of the reasons why development is exploding within Philadelphia (city) is because over the past 3-4 decades, there has been a massive amount of land preservation going on in the suburbs. When sprawl started sprouting out from Philadelphia into the western suburbs, a lot of the existing residents in those areas freaked out because they didn't want to live in sprawl burbs. Pretty methodically land preservation non-profits stepped up to start buying farms and undeveloped wooded areas to take them out of the way of development permantently. Then it became a thing, and even individual townships regularly made massive bond issues to buy open space within their boundaries. Together, my guess is that between the collective efforts of these miscellaneous organizations, they've put permanent easements on hundreds of thousands of acres. It has created a defacto greenbelt in many areas along the western edges of the suburbs.

To make a long story short, even if you're looking at a satellite view of Philly's suburbs, if something looks like open space within say, 30 miles of Philadelphia (at least on the PA side), it is likely preserved at this point. Beyong that point, you'll see sprawly development say, on the far western fringes of Chester County and the far northern fringe of Montgomery County, but that far from the city is an untenable commute for most people and the pressure for development drops considerably.

[edale]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

I think Detroit's issue is that the region develops more than the population can absorb. The auto industry issues might explain why the population growth slowed, but it doesn't explain why the catastrophic depopulation or the core city happened and is still ongoing after nearly 80 years. The only logical explanation for depopulation is overdevelopment.

I don't understand why you think sprawl would be the only factor to explain Detroit's implosion when virtually every city in this country has experienced huge amounts of sprawl and doesn't look like Detroit.

Look at this graphic of Buffalo. It had the same urban area population in 2010 as it did in 1950. Yet the physical footprint of the UA has roughly doubled. If unfettered sprawl + regional population stagnation = Detroit, why does Buffalo not look like Detroit?

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by edale

I don't understand why you think sprawl would be the only factor to explain Detroit's implosion when virtually every city in this country has experienced huge amounts of sprawl and doesn't look like Detroit.

Look at this graphic of Buffalo. It had the same urban area population in 2010 as it did in 1950. Yet the physical footprint of the UA has roughly doubled. If unfettered sprawl + regional population stagnation = Detroit, why does Buffalo not look like Detroit?

This doesn't look like Detroit to you? https://maps.app.goo.gl/uLqaD9Efwu8brvAH6