When we first started our project, we hoped to discover what historical odds are staked against Detroit’s revitalization efforts. Based on information we’d been told growing up, we understood the declining population, and hence shrinking tax-base, presents significant problems for any efforts to rejuvenate Detroit. The simplified argument we have heard on repeat is that people just need to start living in Detroit again. Recently, perhaps due to the public response to Chrysler’s 2011 Super Bowl ad, national media has given attention to all of the exciting things that are happening in the city. In July, the New York Times ran an article “Detroit Pushes Back with Young Muscles,” which likened young adults movement into Detroit to the successful revitalization of Seattle. The article, written with optimism, excitedly presents that although Detroit’s population dropped by 25 percent in the last 10 years, the city had a 59 percent increase in the college educated individuals under the age of 35 (Conlin). The NY Times goes on to detail groups like Move Detroit who actively try to encourage people to move into the city and I Am Young Detroit which both profiles noteworthy young people and acts as a guide to whats new and happening in Detroit. Like the NY Times, we too are excited by this “movement.”
So, here we are just feeling the rush, and wondering, what does Detroit have to do to make this successful? First, we wanted to get a better understanding of the movement of people in Detroit, we analyzed census data using the thematic map creation program GeoCommons. "The Washington Post of February 20, 1973, summarized the population shifts by calling Detroit a city which was getting 'blacker, older, and poorer.'" (Georgakas 189), so we wanted to see for ourselves.
These interactive maps display the trends in Detroit and Wayne County over the years of 1970 to 2000, and in some cases 2008. We used Wayne County to also see the trends surrounding the city over the years. These maps display the change in population density, proportion black, poverty level, and family income over the census tracts. You can click on a certain year, to see what Detroit looked like in that decade. We divided the data into equal quantiles, so you will want to take note of the legend at the bottom right of the page since it will change over the years. The data is shown over a current Google hybrid aerial map so you can see the population as it is distributed relative to current Detroit landmarks. You can click on a certain census tract to see the census statistics for that area of Wayne County.
These interactive maps display the trends in Detroit and Wayne County over the years of 1970 to 2000, and in some cases 2008. We used Wayne County to also see the trends surrounding the city over the years. These maps display the change in population density, proportion black, poverty level, and family income over the census tracts. You can click on a certain year, to see what Detroit looked like in that decade. We divided the data into equal quantiles, so you will want to take note of the legend at the bottom right of the page since it will change over the years. The data is shown over a current Google hybrid aerial map so you can see the population as it is distributed relative to current Detroit landmarks. You can click on a certain census tract to see the census statistics for that area of Wayne County.
WAYNE COUNTY POPULATION DENSITY 1970-2008 BY CENSUS TRACT
WAYNE COUNTY PROPORTION BLACK 1970-2000 BY CENSUS TRACT
WAYNE COUNTY FAMILY INCOME 1970-2008 BY CENSUS TRACT
WAYNE COUNTY PROPORTION POPULATION BENEATH POVERTY LEVEL 1970-2008 BY CENSUS TRACT
Having a visual narrative, we wondered what changed in Detroit from 1970 and on, what types of policy did leaders hope to have influence on these changes. And this is when we lost our high from the NY Times article. Through our research, we discovered that Detroit seems to have been in a constant state of revival attempts and policy at least since the 1967 Race Riots, or Great Rebellion. Dan Georgakas and Marvin Surkin in their book Detroit: I Do Mind Dying show that almost as soon as the riots were quelled two major revitalization efforts stepped up: the New Detroit Committee and black workers (Georgakas 2). The New Detroit Committee, which included Henry Ford II and Walter Reuther the President of the United Auto Workers, keyed in on developing the center of Detroit. Georgakas and Surkin referred to the efforts of the New Detroit Committee as “little more than a recycling of pre-1967 Detroit,” because they did not address substantive issues of the city. Worse, the development actually hurt workers who “found that New Detroit meant working longer and faster and paying higher taxes in exchange for diminishing city services and for wage gains more than outpaced by inflation” (Georgakas 3). Black workers responded to the circumstances alternatively by “[unleashing] a social movement of their own which soon forced a series of organizational, ideological, cultural, political, and economic confrontations with established wealth and power” (Georgakas 2). In 2011, almost 50 years later, Detroit is juggling much of the same issues and development divisions with a significantly smaller population: corridor development via the Woodward Light-Rail, the concerns of Occupy Detroit, and so on.
We hope the blog helps you, as it has helped us, appreciate the challenges of Detroit. Through our exploration, we have settled on one crucial characteristic that will make Detroit’s revitalization different than somewhere like Seattle, and that is its working class roots. Georgakas and Surkin claim that “what clearly differentiated the Detroit experience from other major social movements of the sixties and early seventies was its thoroughly working-class character,” and the revitalization of Detroit will be best served by embracing its heritage (Georgakas 5). We believe this is why Detroiters and Michiganders tear up and cheer every time they see the new Chrysler ads--Chrysler was once the “largest employer and taxpayer in the city” (Widick 242). Chrysler has allowed Detroit to claim pride in the blue collar grit that some have denied and outsiders have attacked. Maybe the lesson we can take from the marketing success of the Chrysler ad campaign is that when Detroit talks about revitalization, it should be on its own terms, engaged with its own hard history and always with the pride of Detroiters at heart.
Our blog will continue with a timeline of important events and statistics that take place in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. We will then write a narrative of the last twenty years and come to conclusions on Detroit's past urban renewal projects and reflect on the current state of renewal in Detroit.
WAYNE COUNTY FAMILY INCOME 1970-2008 BY CENSUS TRACT
WAYNE COUNTY PROPORTION POPULATION BENEATH POVERTY LEVEL 1970-2008 BY CENSUS TRACT
Having a visual narrative, we wondered what changed in Detroit from 1970 and on, what types of policy did leaders hope to have influence on these changes. And this is when we lost our high from the NY Times article. Through our research, we discovered that Detroit seems to have been in a constant state of revival attempts and policy at least since the 1967 Race Riots, or Great Rebellion. Dan Georgakas and Marvin Surkin in their book Detroit: I Do Mind Dying show that almost as soon as the riots were quelled two major revitalization efforts stepped up: the New Detroit Committee and black workers (Georgakas 2). The New Detroit Committee, which included Henry Ford II and Walter Reuther the President of the United Auto Workers, keyed in on developing the center of Detroit. Georgakas and Surkin referred to the efforts of the New Detroit Committee as “little more than a recycling of pre-1967 Detroit,” because they did not address substantive issues of the city. Worse, the development actually hurt workers who “found that New Detroit meant working longer and faster and paying higher taxes in exchange for diminishing city services and for wage gains more than outpaced by inflation” (Georgakas 3). Black workers responded to the circumstances alternatively by “[unleashing] a social movement of their own which soon forced a series of organizational, ideological, cultural, political, and economic confrontations with established wealth and power” (Georgakas 2). In 2011, almost 50 years later, Detroit is juggling much of the same issues and development divisions with a significantly smaller population: corridor development via the Woodward Light-Rail, the concerns of Occupy Detroit, and so on.
We hope the blog helps you, as it has helped us, appreciate the challenges of Detroit. Through our exploration, we have settled on one crucial characteristic that will make Detroit’s revitalization different than somewhere like Seattle, and that is its working class roots. Georgakas and Surkin claim that “what clearly differentiated the Detroit experience from other major social movements of the sixties and early seventies was its thoroughly working-class character,” and the revitalization of Detroit will be best served by embracing its heritage (Georgakas 5). We believe this is why Detroiters and Michiganders tear up and cheer every time they see the new Chrysler ads--Chrysler was once the “largest employer and taxpayer in the city” (Widick 242). Chrysler has allowed Detroit to claim pride in the blue collar grit that some have denied and outsiders have attacked. Maybe the lesson we can take from the marketing success of the Chrysler ad campaign is that when Detroit talks about revitalization, it should be on its own terms, engaged with its own hard history and always with the pride of Detroiters at heart.
Our blog will continue with a timeline of important events and statistics that take place in the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s. We will then write a narrative of the last twenty years and come to conclusions on Detroit's past urban renewal projects and reflect on the current state of renewal in Detroit.
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