Some aerial footage of Detroit. Looks a *lot* like a European city that had been bombed flat in one of their regular wars. There are apparently forty square MILES of abandoned property that the current Mayor is looking to bulldoze. And that’s really the only solution here… clear everyone out of large areas and destroy them utterly. Ruined but still standing buildings are just sources of serious problems, while an empty field is just an empty field.
And from the relevant Fark thread, the best comment by far:
I, for one, am shocked that Detroit is not Utopia. I mean, Detroit has elected Democratic mayors for 50 years straight – how could it possibly fall apart under consecutive decades of unchecked liberal leadership? Shouldn’t everyone in Detroit have their own unicorn by now?
8 Responses to “Devastation Porn”
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.
I know people who have moved out of Detroit; they say it was absolutely terrible. For every house that’s lived in, there’s another 20 or so that are boarded up and abandoned. There are a few decent parts of the city, but they’re like islands in the middle of a jungle. When my friend left Detroit, he said it was amazing how much of his concentration was freed up because he no longer had to worry about getting shot on the street. He and his brother still have some family that haven’t wised up and gotten out yet, but they refuses to visit them so long as they live in the city; it is just that bad.
I read your two previous notes on this, Scott. Something should be said about http://up-ship.com/blog/blog/?p=3010 (‘Most Dangerous’ Neighborhoods In US Ranked).
I’m in Richmond VA, which has Church Hill listed. Church Hill is not a particularly large place, but it is quite definitely divided into two distinct parts. On the third block north of Broad Street the blight starts; across the street from crack houses and abandoned wrecks are exquisitely-refurbished Victorian structures. The yuppies bought into Church Hill 35 years ago as part of the “fix up the old neighborhoods and show solidarity with the disadvantaged” campaign that was popular then. The yuppies dare not cross that street.
On that block and for the next six or eight blocks north, the shootings are legendary and usual. The low-end animals seldom cross into the yuppie area, partly, we think, because they know the yuppies make the place safer than it would be without them: the police know that the City is losing money, and if the yuppies go all that will replace them are more of the criminals across the street.
In about 2003, a group of the disadvantaged folk crossed the street into an open public park where they raped and injured a couple walking there. Several persons claimed publicly that the college kids were attacked because the grass was too high in part of the park where they were attacked. Since then, nothing; but also sales of the properties have dropped dramatically.
I have no reason to go there any more. There used to be a girl, and ….
I am really shocked, Detroit is dying.
never imagine that a large city become a ghost town !
bulldoze is best way, to contrast what happened in Belgium
people life crack houses until there collapse, burndown or
explode do to ripped gas line…
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1246430/Liege-Residential-building-collapses-following-suspected-gas-blast-injuring-20-people.html
Reconsidering now …. It seems to me that, for Richmond VA at least, the area listed as dangerous should have been called “dangerous to productive citizens.” Of the murders in this town, typically about 5% are in (the aforementioned bad part of) Church Hill: the rest are in the projects, none of which are listed.
Speaking of liberal leadership:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article7100943.ece
“An overseas holiday used to be thought of as a reward for a year’s hard work. Now Brussels has declared that tourism is a human right and pensioners, youths and those too poor to afford it should have their travel subsidised by the taxpayer.
The idea for the subsidised tours is the brainchild of Antonio Tajani, the European Union commissioner for enterprise and industry, who was appointed by Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian prime minister.
The scheme, which could cost hundreds of millions of pounds a year, is intended to promote a sense of pride in European culture, bridge the north-south divide in the continent and prop up resorts in their off-season.
Tajani’s programme will be piloted until 2013 and then put into full operation. It will be open to pensioners and anyone over 65, young people between 18 and 25, families facing “difficult social, financial or personal” circumstances and disabled people. The disabled and the elderly can be accompanied by one person.”
I’ve always viewed a vacation has something that was earned, never a human right. Thankfully, the EU has shown me the error of my ways.
Marduk and i were talking about this last night.
I was born in Detroit, and grew up just outside it. Marduk was raised largely in Detroit.
He is of the opinion that the ONLY thing that will salvage any of what is left is “Te Shanghai Solution”, but frankly, there is so little population left that that wouldn’t really work.
Only thing that seems to be possible, is what bing is trying to do now: move folks into “pods”, bull-doze the rest, and create “Green Zones” around the edges.
bing, BTW, is being fought tooth and nail by the Usual Suspects, as is Robert bobb, who is now running the schools, and wants to close and consolidate about half of them.
I think it will be yet another exercise in pouring money down a rat-hole…
🙁
Pictures don’t do it justice. You got to go there and really see it. I have been in open war zones that were not as bad as Detroit.
Hey if its all cheap land, buy up multi-acres worth of land and turn them into miniature ranch properties on the edge of the city.