Detroit suburbs before and now. "Ghost town" in which it is scary to get out of the car. What we saw on the streets of Detroit. Buildings and constructions
Got to Detroit. It was very interesting to look at the dying city.
Detroit was once the fourth most populous city in the United States (after New York, Los Angeles and Chicago) and the capital of the most powerful automotive industry. Here were the factories of the giants Ford, Chrysler and General Motors (as well as Packard and Studebaker), which fed half of the city's residents.
But at some point something went wrong. Several negative factors were superimposed on each other, and the city began to die.
From the middle of the 20th century, auto giants began to experience difficulties. In 1973, the oil crisis hit the Big Three hard, as their cars could not compete with fuel-efficient European and Japanese models. This blow was followed by the energy crisis of '79, and, finally, the financial crisis of 2008-2009, which nearly finished off the American auto industry. The factories were closed one by one, and the workers left the city with their families.
Wealthy residents also left, as Detroit was not adapted to life by car. In the center of Detroit, at some point there was simply not enough space for everyone to travel by car. One of the reasons for the death of Detroit is the discrepancy between its "pre-car" urban planning structure and the set super goal "Each family has a separate car." The city of skyscrapers, with all its desire, cannot live without powerful public transport. As a result, the city center began to die, shops and cultural institutions were closed, as customers stopped visiting them. Rich people moved to the suburbs, and the center was abandoned.
In 1950, 1,850,000 people lived here. Whites began to leave Detroit in the 60s, in particular after the Negro riot of 1967, when, during a series of riots and robberies, the police temporarily lost control of the city. In the 70s, the outflow intensified, and two peaks of emigration occurred in the 80s and 2000s.
There are now less than 700,000 people left in Detroit. In total, 1.4 million white residents left the city after the Second World War. Most settled in relatively prosperous suburbs, but many left the region altogether. By 2013, almost a quarter of Detroit's population (23.1%) did not work, and more than a third of city dwellers (36.4%) lived below the poverty line.
Such a rapid exodus of residents turned Detroit into a ghost town. Many houses, offices, industrial workshops were abandoned. Many are trying to sell their homes and other real estate at bargain prices, but buyers for housing and offices in a depressed city are often simply not found.
In the 80s, local African Americans came up with a new folk fun - burning abandoned houses on Halloween. On another night, up to 800 fires blazed in the city. To stop this process, the authorities created volunteer "Angels of the Night" squads to prevent arson.
In recent years, a total of about 85,000 abandoned properties have been identified in Detroit. In 2014, Detroit adopted a demolition program, which involves the destruction of about half of that number. If we talk about the area of the city, then about a quarter of it is planned to be razed to the ground.
Detroit filed for bankruptcy in 2013 after being unable to pay off $ 18.5 billion in debt to creditors. In December 2014, bankruptcy proceedings were completed. Now the authorities are thinking about how to improve the situation in the city and subsequently return investors.
Many believe that the fate of Detroit is unique, but, firstly, in the history of the United States there have already been bankruptcies of cities (albeit not so large), and, secondly, Detroit is only a part of the famous Rust Belt, which from 70 -s almost entirely in decline due to the reduction in production in a number of branches of heavy industry.
I will make 3 more posts about Detroit: good Detroit, bad Detroit and a post about street art. There are a lot of photos. Until then, take a look at some quick travel notes.
01. We fly up to Detroit. 
02. On the right is the Canadian Windsor, on the left is the American Detroit. The Detroit River separates them. You can get to Canada either by bridge or by road tunnel. 
03. Living suburbs. 
04. Canadians have wind farms. 
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky-tacky,
Little boxes, little boxes,
Little boxes, all the same. 
06.
07. It's scary to fly over America, hundreds of kilometers of identical houses ... 
08. Progress has reached the point that now you do not need to get a ticket at the parking lot, then pay for it and leave. Now you insert a bank card at the entrance, then you insert it at the exit. And that's all. Superfluous procedures with paper tickets die off. 
09. Border with Canada. 
10. Canadians have everything neat and tidy. Detroit is already 70 percent demolished ... a terrible sight. Only empty parking lots remained. 
11. There are practically no living buildings in the center. Sometimes only the first floors are used, but more often buildings are simply boarded up. Now there is very little that is left, everything has been demolished. 
12. The once noisy streets of the center. 
13. 
14. Bar. 
15. Residential areas are also desolate. Most of the houses were demolished ... This is how some areas look ... 
16. And some - so ... 
17. Detroit continues to die, despite all measures taken to save it. 
18. School. 
19. Factory. 
20. They made a parking lot in the theater ... 
21.10 dollars - and you can leave the car in the former theater ... Nice. 
22. Scary. 
23. Do not walk on lawns. 
24. Noah's Ark. 
25. Now they continue to demolish buildings. To prevent dust from rising during construction work, special fans that spray water are used. 
26. Since the 1970s, Detroit has seen a sharp increase in crime. 
27. Most of the crime in the city is drug-related, but there are also a lot of violent crimes. Detroit is considered one of the most dangerous cities in the United States, with an average murder rate 10 times higher than in New York. 
28. Many Americans now compare Detroit to the city of Gotham from the Batman comics, although in the fictional city it was about the merging of power and crime, and the decline of Detroit occurred for socio-economic reasons. 
I'll tell you more about Detroit soon, but while it's time to move on, Chicago is waiting for me!
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“This is not the first time in history. The corpses of other great cities are buried in the deserts and wiped out by the Asian jungle. Some fell so long ago that even their names were gone. But for those who lived there, the destruction seemed no more probable and possible than the death of a gigantic modern city seems to me ... "
John Wyndham. Day of the Triffids
Detroit is a city born and destroyed by cars. Why the richest auto empire, one of the most prestigious cities in the United States of the last century, breathes more and more slowly, turning more and more into the Atlantis of our days - read on AiF.ru.
Former Detroit Railroad Depot. Photo: www.globallookpress.com
Detroit - America's automotive capital, whose metallic clang is literally in the ears after reading the book "Wheels" by Arthur Haley, the site of the international January auto show, which sets the tone for the whole year, the birthplace of the white-skinned rapper Eminem - is officially declared bankrupt.
Literally 50 years ago, the city was almost the most prestigious in the United States, with industry surpassing all other cities in America. Whole communities of immigrants flocked there in search of jobs, a better life, and the American dream. It was in Detroit that the famous Henry Ford assembled his first car and installed the first car manufacturing plant, using the world's first assembly line assembly in production. It was there, in Detroit, that a private car became a common and everyday thing in family life - long before a similar event in any other city.
Abandoned apartment buildings in Detroit. Photo: www.globallookpress.com
Detroit, 2013
Detroit is a city that still has everything: houses, shops, cars, trees, bus stops. But there is no future .
The windows of the once luxurious hotels and theaters are boarded up, and in the past the gilded stucco is covered with dust and cobwebs. In the center of the cottage village of that one-story America, Ilf and Petrov - cheap burnt-out houses, painted with graffiti from the inside. Huge buildings that rise like ocean liners among the fields try to remind of the former greatness of the city, but through broken windows you can see through the empty office space. And there is no future in sight.
It's better not to walk alone on the streets of Detroit today. And it is almost impossible to meet a passer-by at 4-5 pm.
Photo: AiF / Irina Zverkova
Even on the central streets there are enough houses, the first floors of which are sheathed with wooden boards and sheets of iron, so that the entrances do not turn into brothels and fires do not break out. On the surviving shop windows you can barely read the Sale and For Rent inscriptions, washed away by the rains and gray with dust. Apparently, the last owners tried to somehow keep the business afloat.
Unlike European cities, where the entire center is left to the mercy of tourists, in Detroit it is very difficult to buy any souvenir, and even a bottle of water. There are almost no shops, and if there are, then you don't really want to go into them - there is usually a bunch of gloomy people at the entrance ...
This is how the former kingdom of cars looks and breathes today. What happened to the mighty auto empire?
Prosperous Detroit in 1931. Photo: www.globallookpress.com
Detroit, 1910s
The city flourished at the beginning of the 20th century. It was at this time that the economic boom in the automotive industry occurred. Following Henry Ford, General Motors and Chrysler opened their factories in Detroit. Thus, the city was home to the largest automobile enterprises, the “big three”: Ford, General Motors and Chrysler.
The intersection of Michigan and Griswold Streets, 1920. Photo: Commons.wikimedia.org
In the 1930s, with the emergence of unions, Detroit became the arena for the auto workers union against employers. In the 1940s, one of the first American highways, the M-8, passed through the city, and thanks to the economic boom during World War II, Detroit was nicknamed "the arsenal of democracy." The rapid economic growth of the first half of the 20th century was accompanied by an influx of population from the southern states (mostly black) and Europe. Although discrimination in employment (and it was quite strong) weakened, there were problems, and this resulted in a racial riot in 1943, as a result of which 34 people were killed, 25 of them are African Americans.
In the 50s of the XX century, Detroit was one of the main centers of mechanical engineering in the United States, and at that time promoted a program of cheap and affordable cars at the state level. The city experienced a boom in its development - it literally flourished, becoming one of the richest cities in North America. Since the mid-20s, with the development of the auto industry, a large number of private cars have appeared in the city. Detroit was one of the first cities to build a network of expressways and transport interchanges. On the other hand, the public transport system did not develop. On the contrary, car corporations lobbied for the elimination of tram and trolleybus lines. At the same time, there was a campaign, the purchase of a personal car was advertised, and public transport was perceived as low-prestige and inconvenient, as "transport for the poor." Such a transfer of residents to personal vehicles contributed to the movement of the population from the center of Detroit to its suburbs.
General Motors headquarters in Detroit. Photo: www.globallookpress.com
Detroit, 1950s
This marked the beginning of the decline of Detroit. More and more skilled workers were selling housing and leaving to live outside the city for fresh air, even while remaining in their previous jobs.
Along with the resettlement of engineers and workers in the city, a campaign was launched to populate the city center with African Americans. They were allowed to work in a successful city in good firms (a kind of manifestation of American democracy). The emergence of such neighbors further stimulated the outflow of the middle class and elite to the suburbs.
It should be noted that residents of the suburbs of Detroit paid a completely different tax - at the place of residence. As a result of budget cuts, the city began to fade. Jobs were cut, shopkeepers, bankers, doctors moved to places where there are paying customers.
Photo: www.globallookpress.com
In Detroit itself, meanwhile, more and more poor people remained (mostly African Americans) - they simply did not have the money to move out of town.
Among them, crime flourished due to poverty and unemployment, so Detroit quickly fell into disrepute as one of the "blackest" and most dangerous cities in the United States. At this time, racial segregation was abolished in the United States, as a result, African Americans increasingly clashed with whites, and this led to interracial conflict. It culminated in 1967, when the July confrontation erupted into one of the most violent riots in US history, lasting five days known as the 12th Street Riot.
In 1973, the oil crisis erupted. It led to the bankruptcy of many American automakers, whose cars, gluttonous and expensive, could no longer compete with the fuel-efficient European and Japanese cars. Factories one after another began to close, people lost their jobs and left Detroit. The population of the city within its administrative boundaries decreased by 2.5 times: from 1.8 million in the early 1950s to 700 thousand by 2012. It should be noted, however, that these figures also include people who moved to working-class suburbs, where housing cheaper and safer.
Streets of Detroit in the evening. Photo: AiF / Irina Zverkova
Detroit, 2013
Over the past decades, the state government and federal authorities have not abandoned their attempts to revive the city, especially its central part. One of the last initiatives of the 2000s was the creation and construction of several casinos, which still failed to strengthen Detroit's economy. In December 2012, the city budget deficit amounted to $ 30 million.
Detroit is today the city with the highest crime rate and the lowest educational level. And the highest real estate taxes in the United States. Taxes that hundreds of thousands of city residents have not paid. And because of poverty, and because it was easier to redeem your house for a few dollars after the arrest of real estate.
Photo: www.globallookpress.com
By 2013, the most active people left the city, and dependents remained. For every 6 retirees in Detroit, there are 4 people of working age.
If in the last century 70% of the population was white, now 84% of the population is African American. Alas, they are not very educated: only 7% of schoolchildren, according to American studies, can read and count fluently. As a result, Detroit has the highest crime rate in the United States, with the most homicides, with the majority (70%) drug-related.
People just flee from here. From the kingdom of cars.
Correspondents of TUT.BY have already been to Detroit - once the capital of American mechanical engineering, today it is going through hard times. We talked about how they saw this city in the “Big journey of TUT.BY”. Alisa Ksenevich writes about another Detroit - to which one wants to move for a "sedentary life". Because he is amazing, says Alice. And that's why.
I wanted to get to Detroit for a long time and passionately, fascinated by the gloomy, mysterious, viscous like syrup, aesthetics of the films Only Lovers Alive, The Lost River, the works of documentary filmmaker Michael Moore and musician Jack White, as well as the groovy song from the latest album Red Hot Chili Peppers. The whole trip seemed to me like a blind date - in my head there are a lot of images, expectations, but what is there in reality? With Detroit, though, I had instant chemistry. This has already happened once - with New York, and I believed that no other city could knock out this wedge. But, getting to know Detroit and its inhabitants, peering into the details, I became more and more affirmed in the desire to move here after I say goodbye to the turbulent youth in New York and want a settled, family life. Detroit is amazing! And let me tell you why.
Escaping beauty
There is a genre in the art of photography, which in the United States is called "porno-ruins" - when photographers specially travel to Detroit and other cities with signs of desolation and take poignant pictures of abandoned buildings.
I tend to notice beauty where others see ugliness. One of the main properties of beauty is escape. People are aging, buildings are crumbling, gardens are overgrown with wild grass, and an effort must be made to peer at them and get a feel for their history.
There is no need to make an effort to admire the beauty of San Francisco or the beaches of Los Angeles. But they do not sink into the heart, at least to me.
I would say about Detroit in the words of Rainbow Rovewell (author of Eleanor and Park): “She was never beautiful. She was like art, and art doesn't have to be beautiful. It should make you feel something. "
Detroit's abandoned colonial houses (the city was founded in 1710) are beautiful with the beauty that I love - complex, tragic, but still majestic.
I spent a day on the "porno ruins" of Detroit, although they certainly deserve more. People on my way rarely came across, cars stopped a couple of times - the drivers sympathetically asked if everything was okay with me, if I got lost and if I needed help.
As I explored the inside of the house, I had the feeling that someone was watching me or that I was filming a thriller. Ringing silence, dust, some rubbish crunches underfoot, the midday sun breaks through the curtains (how long have they hung on these windows? 30-40 years?) ... Things are scattered on the floor: multi-colored rags, mattresses, wall clocks, a sewing machine, liquid mouthwash, a book with children's counters ... The kitchen cabinet froze in the position of the leaning Leaning Tower of Pisa, inside there are two whole porcelain plates with flowers.
I go up to the second floor along the stairs springing under my feet. The house smells musty, meat chandeliers have been torn from the ceilings. The bathroom contains a cracked mirror and a partially collapsed mosaic. In the children's room there is a chest of drawers of excellent work, they no longer make such, and there is a Bible on the table next to it. Thick, expensively bound with gold embossing, dusty. What happened to the family who lived here? Where are they based? How would you feel returning to your once beautiful and rich home?
Digesting the surging emotions (horror, sadness, admiration), I walked towards the house, where I stopped during my stay in Detroit. I couldn't wait to discuss my impressions with his mistress.
"I am learning to love Detroit as a parent learns to love a foster child"
We didn’t know Tate Austen. When from the many options on airbnb I chose a room in an old mansion in the historic district of Detroit, I could not even imagine that its owner would be a native Petersburg woman and that we have a mutual friend - sculptor and film festival director Rosa Valado, who rented me a room for a year in New York. Even the interiors of both houses are similar: antique furniture, elegant dishes, attention to detail. Tatiana (Tate) Austen has been living in the United States for 26 years, of which 18 in New York, 8 in Detroit. Ballet critic, a graduate of the Moscow Literary Institute and the Leningrad Theater Institute, she revolved in the field of art all her life. In New York, she and her husband had their own gallery. In 2009, when the American economy bottomed out, the couple moved to Detroit.
“We saw a TV program that told about the economic decline of Detroit, about the terrible state of the most beautiful houses built before the sixties of the last century,” says Tatiana. - We immediately wanted to go there and see everything with our own eyes. Detroit was truly a "ghost town" at the time. There were almost no cars on the roads, people on the streets. City lighting was absent in many areas. The beautiful multi-storey buildings in the city center were abandoned and empty. If desired, one could climb onto the roof of such a building and fry kebabs there, which many did. Looking at these buildings, I had the feeling that they are like orphans looking for a loving family that will restore them and bring them back to life.
Seven years ago, property prices in Detroit were unbelievably low. You could buy a house for 7-10-15 thousand dollars. Tatiana and her husband began to buy and restore historical, brick houses built in the colonial style, looking for new owners for them. However, the main reason and purpose of their stay in Detroit was to create a museum where we could promote types of contemporary art based on light: photography, video, projection, laser, neon, three-dimensional technology, and so on. They bought an abandoned bank building, restored it and began to hold exhibitions, the first of which was called Time and Place. The Kunsthalle Detroit Museum existed until 2014. Its activity had to be suspended, as it was not possible to obtain financial support from local authorities and foundations.
Now, 7 years later, home prices in Detroit have increased 10 times, which still makes them affordable compared to similar housing prices in other states. The abandoned warehouse premises of downtown (the business, most comfortable area of the city) are being converted into trendy, comfortable lofts. Cars are cheap. The food is great. Many young people under the age of 30 are moving to Detroit who want to do business and start families here.
“I have a love-hate relationship with this city,” admits Tatiana. “I hate Detroit because it cut me off from the cultural and social life I enjoyed living in Manhattan. On the other hand, I have overcome my fear of the unknown. Being a ballet critic and poet by vocation and education, I learned to understand electrical wiring, plumbing systems, roof repairs - no manicure can stand that. In New York, I was (and still am) an educated consumer, a part of a grateful audience, a social butterfly.
In Detroit, I became part of the force that is changing the face of the city, one of its trustees. I have changed buildings, events, even the lives of some people. I'm learning to love Detroit, like a parent probably learns to love an adopted child. I miss the theater, my hyperactivity in New York, but there is an opportunity to do something that would be impossible in other cities. In eight years, Detroit has transformed the way other cities are transformed in several decades! Being a part of this story, observing the process from the inside and actively participating in it is an extraordinary feeling. I have a friend here, a black woman 94 years old. She remembers Detroit from 1926. So, she says, "People come and go, but if they stay, they stick to Detroit."
Remnants of luxury
On the second day, I had a long hike planned with Detroit native Damon Gallagher. Many Americans have such an attractive feature as mobility. They move relatively easily from one city (or state) to another in search of better opportunities for study, a career, and a family. Wherever Damon didn’t live and what he didn’t do! He also had a bar in New Orleans called Flying Saucer and his own rock band in Oakland, now a small recording studio in Detroit next to an antique store.
I'm in a great mood, and I start humming one of my favorite songs from the Red Hot Chili Peppers: "Don" t you worry, baby, I’m like ... Detroit, I’m crazy ... "Damon winces in disgust.
- What does Anthony Kiedis (frontman of the Red Hot Chili Peppers - A.K.) know about Detroit to sing about? He never lived here! Let him compose songs about California. Who can really say something about Detroit through his art is Jack White (White Stripes frontman - A.K.). He grew up here, his mother worked as a cleaner in a Masonic temple. He saved this temple when it was about to be closed for debts and put up for sale at an auction.
But this is already interesting! I ask Damon to take me to the temple - the largest Masonic temple in the world.
The building, to be sure, is majestic and occupies the entire quarter. 14 floors, about 1000 rooms. Within its walls, the best musicians of the world perform (Nick Cave, The Who, Rolling Stones, etc.), immersive performances are held (nowadays fashionable format, which involves spectators wandering around the floors and rooms in which theatrical performance takes place).
In 2013, Jack White anonymously donated $ 142,000 to the temple - this is how much the Detroit Masonic Temple Society owed to the state in unpaid taxes. In gratitude for this broad gesture, the Society of Freemasons renamed the cathedral theater of the temple to the Jack White Theater. So, in fact, the identity of the mysterious patron was revealed.
This is not the first time Jack White has helped his hometown. In 2009, the musician donated 170 thousand dollars to renovate a baseball field in a park where he played ball as a child.
Ten years ago, Dan Gilbert, head of America's largest home loan company Quicken loans, relocated headquarters to Detroit, and with it 7,000 interns. He purchased and renovated over a hundred buildings, allowing his employees to live in those buildings, paying subsidized rent for the first year. Another ten thousand specialists came for the first batch, which became a catalyst for the development of small business and the restaurant industry. After almost half a century of disintegration and oblivion, the city began to revive and develop rapidly.
In downtown there is another beautiful structure that looks more like a cathedral than a commercial center - the Fisher House. The building was built in 1928 by the brilliant American architect Alexander Kahn. When we went inside, my jaw literally dropped. Marble, granite, bronze, vaulted painted ceilings, mosaics, stunning Art Deco lamps and chandeliers. Everything is real, since that time, in excellent condition. In my opinion, it was sacrilege to open a coffee shop within these walls with a plastic counter, cheap coffee and donuts. However, it is there. I wanted to close my eyes and imagine myself here in the 1920s, when Detroit was at the peak of its power and two million people were scurrying back and forth like New Yorkers are scurrying back and forth now.
The building of the former railway station, built in 1914, left a sad impression. In those years, it was the tallest train station in the world and served over 4,000 passengers a day. After the war, many Americans switched to private vehicles, which reduced the passenger volume to a critical level, and it was more profitable for the station owners to sell the building than continue to maintain it. Nevertheless, it was not possible to find buyers - no one wanted to acquire it even for a third of the cost of its construction. In 1967, shops, restaurants and most of the waiting room were closed in the station building. In 1988, the station itself stopped working. Floods, fires, raids of vandals disfigured the pearl of architecture.
In 2009, the city government decided to demolish the building. A week later, a Detroit resident with the speaking surname Christmas challenged the decision in court, citing national legislation, in particular the 1966 Historic Preservation Act. A person with a strong civic position who dares to go against the authorities deserves admiration in himself. The fact that he won this trial can be regarded as a miracle. For me, this is another reason to love America.
How much is the quarter now?
The outskirts of Detroit resemble Minsk Shabans until we run into a fence, artistically sprinkled with paint and pasted over with pieces of mirrors of different sizes. Behind the fence is a house, decorated from top to bottom with the same mirror mosaic. The owner of the house is an artist and owner of the largest collection of beads in the world. We were unable to view the collection, as the owner was not at home.
Heat and humidity make themselves felt. In the shop we go to to buy water, I am surprised to see the bulletproof glass separating the seller and the buyers. I have seen such counters only in a few points of sale of alcohol in disadvantaged areas of New York.
- Even alcohol is not sold right there! - I am surprised.
“It's safer to live in Detroit, but still not to the point where armed robbery is not possible,” Damon replies. - The unemployment rate is high in the city. Here, even pizza is not served after 10 pm - the delivery men fear for their lives.
Until the early 2000s, there was not a single major food chain in Detroit. The glory of the most criminal city was entrenched in the city in 1967, when during the riots in the streets of the city 43 people died, 1200 were injured, 2500 shops and 488 private houses were burned and destroyed.
It all started with a police raid in the "Blind Pig" bar, which illegally sold alcohol and arranged gambling. The bar was crowded when law enforcement arrived, with 82 African Americans celebrating their friends' return from the Vietnam War. The police arrested everyone indiscriminately. Passers-by, gathered in the street, began to resent the lawlessness and throw bottles at the cops. The conflict gave rise to riots - about 10 thousand people took to the streets and began to smash and rob shops, churches, private houses. At that time, in Detroit, the unemployment rate for blacks was twice the unemployment rate for whites. Outbreaks of violence, robberies, looting shook the city for five days. Fires blazed in the buildings. It was possible to pacify the raging crowd only with the involvement of military divisions.
About thirty thousand families left Detroit, ceasing to pay property taxes. Electricity was no longer supplied to the deserted areas, the roads were overgrown with weeds, and wild animals began to visit. Even now, you can meet pheasants in the city, and something is constantly roaming about in the bushes.
Detroit's beautiful and varied churches were destroyed by vandals. It got to the point that the local punks entertained themselves by burning the church on the eve of Halloween, thus marking the "night of the devil." On this night, many American children are playing pranks: overturning trash cans, hanging toilet paper on trees, but Detroit's children have reached a new level.
Some of the houses have survived in a condition that is attractive enough for buyers, and found new owners through auctions. So, five years ago, Damon's friend bought a whole block - 8 houses standing in a row - for 50 thousand dollars. His dream was to settle his friends and relatives in these houses. To those who decided on an adventure, he sold the houses with a minimal mark-up. The rest were renovated and sold at a good profit.
"We do not need this your gentrification"
In the evening I go to a bar where the unknown White Stripes used to play. The establishment is no different from those that thrive in New York - a stylish, ironic interior, a bartender with a pronounced sense of self-esteem, hipsters like to hang out in these. A guy named Stan speaks to me. A young teacher teaching Spanish and English in high school. He grew up in a "white" suburb of Detroit, in his free time he plays in a rock group with a name, after hearing which I laughed for a long time, but did not dare to tell Stan that this "meaningless set of letters", which the guys called themselves out of principle, so that to be different from everyone, in Russian it has a completely definite (and rather slippery!) meaning.
We talk with Stan for two hours about music and Detroit, and later we are joined by his friend Etienne, a chemical scientist who came to Detroit six years ago from France. Etienne is also in a band with a slippery name - he plays the trombone.
“To tell you the truth, we don't like Detroit getting trendy,” the guys say. - Wealthy hipsters come here, buy real estate, these coffee shops with vegan pastries and coffee for $ 7 a cup appeared ... The territory of Detroit could contain San Francisco, Boston, Manhattan, and still there would be room. And 740 thousand people live here. We know each other by sight. Six years ago there was a feeling that this city was ours, we know all its features, cool places. And now business comes here, competition, all this "renaissance" is taking place, about which the New York Times has been writing super-optimistic articles for five years now. But after all, with all this improvement and the rise of the real estate market, the face of Detroit is changing, the composition of its inhabitants, living here is no longer as cheap as before - rental prices have doubled over the past three years!
By the way, about the prices. In a restaurant with excellent service quality and excellent cuisine, the price of any cocktail is $ 2. Second course - $ 3. I peered at the menu for a long time, not believing my eyes. Maybe this is some kind of special promotion? Maybe a typo? It was psychologically difficult to accept the fact that the chicken curry, which I pay $ 14 in New York for, costs five times less here. Some kind of parallel reality, by God.
The young teacher, earning less than three thousand a month, lives alone in a two-room apartment in the city center, paying $ 550 in rent. He has sufficient funds left for food, clothing and entertainment. The group Stan plays in does not even rehearse in the garage, but in the building of a former glasses factory. The guys collectively pay $ 100 a month to rent this space! It is not surprising that so many creative people - artists, musicians - move from New York to Detroit. Thanks to this new blood, Detroit has a great music scene and simply gorgeous murals.
I understand well the desire of Stan and Etienne to leave everything as it is. The same renaissance is now going through Bushwick, the area where I live. Two years ago, it was a dormitory, artistic Brooklyn neighborhood with affordable rental rates and one grocery store per ten blocks. There weren't a lot of places for leisure, but they were cool - with parties for friends, an eccentric and strange crowd, bars where everyone could read poetry and give concerts. As a result of all this musical and artistic movement, Bushwick became fashionable. A Michelin-starred restaurant was opened here. Tourists began to come here. Hotels and apartment complexes with concierges have sprung up like mushrooms after a rain. I don't know if I can afford Bushwick in two years. In any case, it will no longer be the unique, charming in its underdevelopment and freedom of expression area that I fell in love with.
I ask Stan what he likes and dislikes the most about Detroit.
- I like that here you can make a real contribution to the musical, cultural, political life of the city. A simple example is the building of an aquarium on the urban island of El Bel. The oldest aquarium in America, built by the famous architect Albert Kahn, has been empty since the sixties of the last century. The building was closed in 2005. In 2012, with the help of a small group of Detroit volunteers, the aquarium was filled with fish - about 1000 fish of more than 118 species. Now this symbol of the city is open to the public. I like that Detroit residents are confident in themselves, but not arrogant and optimistic about life. I like that there is so much history in this city that even having lived here all your life, you continue to learn something new and be surprised. I do not like the degree of corruption of the authorities. The city needs leaders who care more about the city than their own egos and welfare. The money, which in theory should go to the improvement of schools, the improvement of the social sphere, flows into the pockets of millionaires who are building another sports stadium or casino. Why do we need a fourth casino? So that people who are not already rich become even poorer? The fact that the former director of Detroit's central library is in jail for embezzling public funds speaks volumes. The quality of school education in Detroit itself is lame, to put it mildly. Good schools are in wealthy, "white" suburbs. The police are also not particularly vigilant. People drive as they want, often drunk. My friend was stopped by an inspector. They found weed in the car, alcohol in the blood of a friend. Then the inspector said: "The main thing is that it is not cocaine!" and let him go without even fining him.
Detroit shook me, charmed, puzzled ... I don't even want to convince people about it, especially those who have never been there. This city is not for everyone. But maybe just right for me. In short, it would be necessary to find out if the band with a slippery name does not need a keyboard player.
Alisa Ksenevich
Moved to New York 5 years ago. Prior to that, she worked in Belarus for 5 years as a correspondent for the newspaper "Observer", wrote for the "Women's Journal" and Milavitsa.
During her life in New York she wrote the book New York for Life, which is sold on Amazon.
TUT.BY book chapters on the portal.
There were times when Detroit's population exceeded 1.8 million. Today it is home to three times less - 681,090 people. 1805 was a tragic milestone for the city - Detroit was almost completely burned out.
Detroit is in the top ten the most criminal cities in the world and is consistently leading in similar ratings in the United States.
However, not everything is so gloomy! A famous rapper was born and raised here Eminem. Francis Ford Coppola, director of the trilogy "The Godfather", is also from Detroit. From here the musical style spread throughout the world " techno". All the most important automotive events for the United States take place in Detroit! It was here that the first affordable family car was created ( Ford model T), a Henry Ford founded Ford Motor Company and opened his first factory. Thanks to Detroit for the cream soda too.
Rentals in Detroit
Housing and rental prices are obscenely low! However, rumors that a two-story country house can be purchased for $ 100-200 is not worth believing. A couple of years ago, it was possible to find a house for $ 500 at special auctions, but it would take ten thousand more to equip such a house. Now the most budgetary option will cost about $ 1.5 thousand (but still without renovation).
Work in Detroit
And here is the answer to the surprised looks caused by real estate prices. In Detroit, more than half of the buildings are abandoned. The unemployment rate reaches 20%. The streets are ruled by crime and poverty.
Many houses lack water and electricity. In factories, salaries are scanty. Young people are increasingly choosing crime.
What happened to Detroit
The beginning of the 20th century is Detroit's finest hour. Then there was an economic boom in mechanical engineering. Not only Henry Ford, but also corporations decided to settle in the City of Motors General motors and Chrysler, collectively referred to as the "big three".
Almost every family had a car. Public transport was considered inconvenient and not prestigious. Infrastructure developed rapidly, every millimeter of the city flourished - everyone, except for the sphere of public transport. Which later played a cruel joke with Detroit.
The machine was equal to freedom of movement. Why not move out of town then? Most Detroitans did just that.
With the budget cuts, the city began to wither. In the early 60s, the changes were still imperceptible, but later - more. Only those who did not have the means to move at all remained within the city limits, and the middle class and elite left Detroit.
The city was finally abandoned after the 1973 oil crisis. There is less gasoline - there is nothing to refuel the car, but with public transport, as we remember, there is no situation. The authorities were shocked by such a rapid extinction, because this is the first such case in American history.
Fewer people - the economic turnover of the city falls - jobs are reduced - hello, unemployment. Salaries are scanty, crime is high.
Today Detroit looks like a backdrop for filming a post-apocalyptic action movie. The planet's population is growing rapidly, but not here.
The business center of the city is in the best condition (as far as possible in the current situation). Skyscrapers, where thousands of clerks rush to work every day, shops and shopping centers are functioning.
The headquarters of Ford, General Motors, Chrysler corporations are still in place, which helps the city to stay on its feet.
Important
At night in Detroit, you need to be at home, behind a locked door. The streets are empty early, and civilization goes to sleep. With dusk, crime wakes up in Detroit.
Do you want to buy a house in the States for just a couple of dollars and see with your own eyes the real scenery for Hollywood horror films? - Come to Detroit! But better not: the once richest industrial city is slowly turning into ruins, on which drug trafficking and crime flourish. Detroit today has more than 33,000 abandoned buildings - empty skyscrapers, shopping malls, factories, schools and hospitals - in short, a quarter of the city should be bulldozed right now. How is it that the hapless "West Paris" has come to this?
Birth
Detroit (Detroit, from the French "deathrois" - "strait") is located in the north of the United States, in the state of Michigan. It was founded on July 24, 1701 by the Frenchman Antoine Lome as a Canadian trading post for the fur trade with the Indians. However, in 1796 this region was ceded to the United States. Like the Phoenix Bird, Detroit was reborn from the ashes after a fire in 1805 that destroyed most of the city. However, empires do not hold on to logs and bricks: the advantageous location on the waterway of the Great Lakes system has made Detroit a major transportation hub. The restored city remained the capital of Michigan until the mid-19th century. The urban economy at this time relied entirely on the successful shipbuilding industry.
Flourishing
At the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries, Detroit entered a "golden age": luxurious buildings and mansions with architectural delights were built, and Washington Boulevard was brightly lit by Edison bulbs. For this, the city was nicknamed "the Paris of the West" - and it was here that Henry Ford created his own car model and founded the "Ford Motor Company" in 1904. His example was inspired by Duran (General Motors), the Dodge brothers (Dodge), Packard (Hewlett-Packard) and Chrysler (Chrysler) - their factories turned Detroit into a real automobile capital of the world.
The rapid economic growth in the first half of the 20th century required a large number of workers, so black people from the southern states, as well as Europe, came to Detroit to work. A large number of private cars appeared in the city, as well as a network of high-speed highways and transport interchanges.
At the same time, an advertising campaign was being promoted, the task of which was to make public transport less prestigious as “transport for the poor”. When you have your own car, it no longer makes sense to live near work: earn money in the city, live in a green suburb! Then no one suspected that the relocation of engineers and skilled workers outside the city limits would lay the foundation for today's desolation ...
And even when there are too many cars, an old "out-of-the-box" horse can be used for household needs. For example, in the 1950s, river bank erosion became a real environmental problem in Detroit - and it was creatively replaced by another environmental problem, reinforcing the coastline with old "wheelbarrows". This "cart" is still there - rusty and green piles of cars still poison the water with paint and oil. But who, in the middle of the last century, could have known that after a few decades, many districts of the city would also look like garbage dumps?
Beginning of the End
What was the government's goal in making fun of public transport? Of course, it all came down to economic benefits: people should buy more. But they did not foresee that the move of the wealthiest part of the population from the center of Detroit would deprive the entire service sector of work: bank employees, hospitals, shop owners.
Gathering the essentials, they rushed in pursuit of a source of income, leaving only low-paid African-American workers in the city, living on the benefits of the unemployed and homeless.
Poverty and lack of prospects pushed the "abandoned" people in the center to criminal gangs, and Detroit quickly gained notoriety as one of the "blackest" and most dangerous cities in the United States.
But the troubles of "West Paris" did not end there: in 1973, the oil crisis broke out, bankrupt American car manufacturers: their cars were not only expensive, but also consumed a lot of gasoline.
At the same time, economical Japanese brands confidently entered the market, and it became impossible to compete with them. The employees of the closing factories lost their jobs and dispersed aimlessly.
Today
The population of Detroit and its suburbs has decreased by 2.5 times: if in the early 1950s, 1.8 million people lived here, today there are hardly 700 thousand of them. The city itself in places looks like pictures of the ruins of a human civilization enslaved by aliens from the fantastic movie "Battlefield - Earth".
Buildings with broken glass and trees sprouting from their walls are strangely intertwined with streets, brightly lit shop windows, and graffiti-covered ghetto quarters.
The sparsely populated center of Detroit, no matter what, remains a collection of cultural and sports centers, as well as architectural monuments of the past century and continues to attract tourists.
In addition, Detroit is still home to the headquarters of the largest automakers and is home to a limited number of workers. Numerous Arab immigrants found refuge here.
All the latter authorities are not abandoning their attempts to revive the city and approved the construction of several casinos: they did not strengthen the Detroit economy, but they revived local leisure at least a little.
But the local ruins are of interest to Hollywood directors - they are ready to pay for such realistic and unforgettable scenery for anti-utopian films, horror films, scenes of disasters and crimes.
In addition, abandoned houses serve as a real art space for Detroit's most restless artists. One of them - a certain Heidelberg - turned an entire block into eerie installations, decorating walls, fences, lawns and pillars with all sorts of trash: plush toys thrown away by mixers, shoes ... Tourists, by the way, considered Heidelberg's works to be quite good and, most importantly, a free attraction.
Perspectives
In the second half of the 20th century, the whole of America considered what was happening in Detroit funny - and repeatedly ridiculed the city that had fallen to its knees. But today the joke has lost its sharpness: the same story is happening with dozens of other post-industrial cities and towns throughout the United States. But what does this say? The politics of consumerism and the non-ecological approach to production have already reached an absolute dead end - and only thanks to this, there is a gradual transition to "green thinking" all over the world. Fate gives lemon only so that we make lemonade out of it.
