Archive for the 'homeless' Category
A man died here…
Published January 16th, 2010 in dysfunctional, housing, body, dead, Matty Moroun, homeless, abandoned, decay, photography, Michigan, photos, urban, cold and Detroit. 1 Comment
Updated Map of Abandonment
Published November 14th, 2009 in housing, real estate, dysfunctional, homeless, arson, abandone houses, abandoned, decay, poverty, Michigan, photography, photos, urban and Detroit. 1 Comment
View Detroit Photos in a larger map
The abandoned house of the week
Published August 18th, 2009 in housing, abandoned, dysfunctional, homeless, abandone houses, decay, urban, poverty, Michigan, economy, photography, photos and Detroit. 0 Comments
The abandoned neighborhood of the week
Published August 17th, 2009 in real estate, abandoned, housing, homeless, wildflowers, flowers, decay, urban, summer, Michigan, photography, photos, morning and Detroit. 4 Comments
The Abandoned House of the week, and the remaking of Detroit
Published April 12th, 2009 in housing, industry, abandoned, decay, recession, bailout, abandone houses, homeless, dysfunctional, industrial, urban, politics, poverty, Michigan, Detroit, politicians, economy, photos, photography, big three and Uncategorized. 5 Comments
I saw the following in a Richard Florida article in the Atlantic Monthly, titled How The Crash Will Reshape America: “The great urbanist Jane Jacobs was among the first to identify cities’ diverse economic and social structures as the true engines of growth. Although the specialization identified by Adam Smith creates powerful efficiency gains, Jacobs argued that the jostling of many different professions and different types of people, all in a dense environment, is an essential spur to innovation—to the creation of things that are truly new. And innovation, in the long run, is what keeps cities vital and relevant.”
My experience has certainly led me to believe that this is true. I recently read this article about “job sprawl”, which is the condition that exists in Metro Detroit, where most of the jobs are far away from the city core. I once read an article in the Oakland Business Review, about a company located in Oxford, who was unable to find a qualified software engineer. My first thought was, “no shit?” If you are located over 40 miles from the nearest large city, you should probably expect it to be hard to fill technical positions that require a lot of training, and/or education. It looked like a good fit for me, but living in Berkley at the time it was still 30 miles away, and probably an hour or more drive in rush hour traffic. When living in Washington, D.C., I was bombarded with calls and emails from recruiters and head hunters, trying to fill web developer positions in the D.C. area. If the job was not located on the Metro line, or at least within walking distance of the line, I simply said I wasn’t interested.
If you employ low skilled workers you can locate almost anywhere, but if you need highly skilled, and/or educated, you’re best bet is to be near an area with a relatively high population density. It’s fairly easy to find low skilled workers. Not so when it comes to skilled labor. I’ve had recruiters from around the country contact me because of my specific skill set. They are often having trouble filling these positions. I’ve now worked for multiple companies in densely populated areas that had trouble filling positions. In fact I am currently working for a company that has been trying to fill positions since before I began work there almost a year ago. They are located in an urban center where there is an active high tech community. If they were located 40+ miles from the city, their chances of filling the positions would be slim to none. It’s not that tech workers don’t like the country side; it’s just that in an urban setting you have a much higher concentration of such workers. Your chances of finding the person to fill your high tech role far from the city are not as likely. Someone is going to have a long drive…if they’re willing to do it at all.
Will this change in Detroit? I don’t know. I’m not all that optimistic about Metro Detroit’s outlook. Areas like Royal Oak, and Ann Arbor at least have, arguably, resources, infrastructure and population density to decent tech centers. Currently, Ann Arbor is the area most resembling a creative center, and has the advantage of one of the best public universities in the country. Detroit has the New Center Area, and the Central Business District, but both areas are fairly far from the areas with the highest concentrations of creative workers such as Ferndale, Royal Oak, and Ann Arbor. Detroit has a long way to go to even approach the level of safety, livability, and urban conveniences that the previously mentioned suburban areas already have. Detroit’s advantage at this point are the incredibly low costs of land and buildings. The fact that a start up could acquire large amounts of space and land for very little money should a selling point. The fact that the area is losing the very residents a start up often needs, along with a reputation of as one of the most dangerous cities in the country makes the few pluses at lot less valuable. Detroit will need both the grass roots enthusiasm it’s been seeing, along with large amounts of public, and private funding to even have a chance of becoming a reasonably desirable place to live or do business.
The abandoned house of the week…cheap houses, a smoking ban, and mass transit?
Published March 19th, 2009 in transit, news, housing, real estate, public transportation, light rail, abandone houses, homeless, dysfunctional, satire, abandoned, poverty, urban living, Michigan, Detroit, economy, photography, decay, urban, photos and Uncategorized. 7 Comments
I’ve just begun using Twitter. I’m really just kind of eavesdropping on other peoples conversations, or at least parts of conversations. According to my eavesdropping the hot topic regarding Detroit is cheap houses. With NPR, Anderson Cooper, The New York Times, CNN, and other news organizations reporting that houses are selling for as low as $1, artists are buying up neighborhoods, foreigners are snapping up real estate for investment, and Detroit’s rebirth is right around the corner, it seems everyone wants to buy a house in Detroit.
Some of the Tweets I saw on the topic of cheap houses in Detroit included:
“They just said on NPR that you can buy a slightly run down house in Detroit for 100 bucks.”
“foreign investors flocking to detroit for cheap houses. me want in!”
“We should all move to Detroit. $100 houses. We could live off our savings for years.”
“Are you buying a house in Detroit? Are the $8000 houses habitable, and in safe neighborhoods?”
“I think I am going to start investing in Detroit too, and so should you. Houses for $12K, thats crazy!”
A few of the articles really make it sound like a great opportunity to get in on a creative revolution in the Motor City, but if you read more than a few of the articles, and listen to some of the reports, you quickly learn what most Metro Detroiters already know; that it’s not so simple.
Listening to the NPR report you find out that even as some are moving in to a neighborhood, others are desperate to get out. Even the two artists, who are the story’s focus, admit their house has been broken into three times, and one of them has been threatened. Detroit’s poverty rate is about as high as it gets in the developed world, the unemployment rate is above 20%, and the crime rates are equally high. Furthermore getting a house up to code in Detroit is a test of anyone’s commitment, and insuring that house, and your car (which can’t get by without in Detroit)is ridiculously expensive.
And then of course there’s Detroit’s wonderful city services. Will your garbage get picked up? How long will it take to get power back after desperate thieves steal the transformer off the pole down the street? What happens if you’re robbed, shot, or otherwise injure…how long will it take to get police (when I was trapped by a pack of wild dogs, the police operator told me it would be a couple of hours), or EMS to arrive? Where do you go for groceries? Kids? …forget it.
I’d love to go down, and buy a cheap place, fix it up, and be a part of a renaissance, but unless a couple hundred of my friends decide to do the same thing, at the same time, I’m likely putting myself, and my family in a bad situation. Is it worth it to be an urban pioneer with all of the risks involved, simply to get dirt cheap housing? The thousands that leave Detroit each year would say no. Many have struggled for years, to make the situation workable, and most have failed. Not all of the areas in Detroit are not bad, but you won’t find $500 houses in those areas. The prices in the nicer areas aren’t that high compared to other urban areas in the U.S., but they’re much higher than the prices thrown around in the recent reports.
I hope this trend continues, and some creative oases arise from the urban rubble of Detroit. I feel there are some opportunities for some special people, and maybe someday, some areas will actually attract average people who don’t want to be burglarized on a regular basis, who don’t want to pay several thousand dollars per year for auto insurance, who don’t want to have to drive back out to the suburbs for groceries, and who actually want to feel somewhat safe in their homes.
Warning: From this point down, large amounts of sarcasm will be used.
Other topics being mentioned on Twitter include Metro Detroit mass transit, and another attempt at passing a smoking ban in bars and restaurants. Mass transit is still a ways away from reality in Metro Detroit, but at least our regional politicians are getting on board. Less than eight years ago, L. Brookes Patterson, stated on Michigan Public Radio, that “we can’t afford to invest a dime in an experiment like mass transit.” Apparently after eight long years of testing around the world, he’s concluded that mass transit is no longer experimental. Whew…glad that’s been determined. Fortunately our leaders are only about 40 years late on making a decision that the are needs a comprehensive transit system. Maybe if they get it running in another 15 years, we can really attract that younger, highly educated demographic we’re looking for.
And bar and restaurant owners, against most widely available studies on the subject, are dead set against joining the rest of the country in banning smoking indoors in public eating and drinking establishments. Obviously the ban has been detrimental to the local economies in New York, California, Italy, Chicago, and many other major cities, and countries around the world. In fact the ban is probably the cause of this world wide recession. Smokers have just stopped going to bars and restaurants. Good thing Michigan dodged that bullet.
The abandoned house of the week
Published February 17th, 2009 in abandoned, decay, housing, dysfunctional, homeless, urban, photos, Michigan, urban living, poverty, photography and Detroit. 0 Comments
Dead body frozen in ice…
Published January 30th, 2009 in news, housing, industry, dysfunctional, body, Matty Moroun, homeless, dead, abandoned, decay, photography, poverty, Michigan, photos, winter, cold, urban and Detroit. 2 CommentsA disturbing article in the Detroit News:
Frozen in indifference: Life goes on around body found in vacant warehouse
While this could happen in many American cities, it does say a lot about Detroit. The level of indifference in the area is incredible, and won’t change any time soon. Detroit won’t improve until enough people care. Until enough people care, Detroit will not attract the kind of people needed to bring the right kind of change to area. And the attitude won’t change until a majority of those living in Detroit have some hope. And as long as poverty rates hover around 40%, unemployment rates continue to climb, and the education rates remain low, hope will remain illusive for many Detroiters.
Below are two iconic structures owned by Matty Maroun (mentioned in the preceding article). It’s amazing that an individual such as Matty is allowed to leave many of his structures unmaintained. In most cities, the buildings would have been condemned long ago by city or county agencies. Somehow Matty is able to get away with actions that no one else would be able to pull off.
