Detroit becoming a ghost town?

A friend of mine sent me these links with some pictures of public buildings in the city.

http://blogs.denverpost.com/captured/2011/02/07/captured-the-ruins-of-detroit/2672/

http://www.disappearing-architectur...n-ghost-town/detroit-a-modern-ghost-town.html

http://hnn.us/articles/124582.html

 

Well, looks like they really are gonna film a Robocop reboot...

 

They look more like fixed installations of modern art

 

Somewhere there is a picture of an old Library repository with a huge pile of rotting books. In the middle of one of the piles there is a 6-10ft tree growing out of it inside a building.

Pretty much says all you need to know about Detroit.

 

Something similar had happened to the Ruhrgebiet in Germany when the majority of the coal industry closed its mines forever. It's always fatal when the entity of a city depends on an industry that's based there. I have to say the Ruhrgebiet doesn't look half as bad as Detroit though, the government has invested a lot of money in the reestablishment of the area and uses many of the abandoned factory outlets now as museums or to host events.

Not too long ago I've seen a documentary about Detroit and why it came to this. One part of it was the old-fashioned way in which America's car companies designed their products. I guess they could have survived the invasion of Asian cars if they'd focussed more on energy efficiency instead of building the same car from 1955 again and again in a new design.

 

It's amazing the ability of human beings to drive themselves out of theyr homes. The first thing that came to my mind with these pics is Chernobyl's ghost cities..Somehow we always manage to fuck it up.

 

Ah, the fun we'll have after the stupid fucking economy collapses (Carlin, 1999) and takes the capitalist system with it! Will we get to reclaim our spaces, our cities, our empty buildings?

It must be really depressive, but artistically, it's so interesting.

It just really sucks that this means that thousands of people lost their livelihoods and their way of life after lining the pockets of some golden-parachute asshole cocksucker executives who still live in luxury with the fruits of the work of millions of others.

 

The new wave of Neoliberal Free-Market Capitalism is really like a nuclear catastrophe of sorts; the destruction of humanity, the dehumanisation of people, the depredation of mankind until nothing alive remains.

When profits are worth more than people, the free market eventually decides extermination is the way to go. And this is how it happens.

 

Oh come on!
As far as I know car companies in the US always paid very good. Even too good, like in the case of General Motors. What did pay them? 40, 50 bucks an hour for a guy at the Assembly line? They were basically digging their own grave (the companies), but you can't say the simple workers didn't benefit from it. I doubt the average Joe who worked at the assembly line of General Motors would have earned 50 bucks an hour if he had to work somewhere else.

 

From one of the blog comments from the 1st link.

"Two points to make here. First, these photos are so old that they do not show the current reality. For example, the Fort Shelby Hotel has been completely renovated since these photographs were taken and has been open for business for over a year. Also, the Book Cadillac Hotel has been lavishly restored and has been in operation for over a year.

Many other downtown buildings have been renovated or are in the process. The Kales Building is one of several office buildings that have been successfully converted to apartments. There are plans for some of the buildings shown here to also be transformed into residential living."

To be fair, give me a day and I could easily run around London (or Rome where I am now...) and take a load of pictures of 'abandoned' places. Still, must be great if you're homeless living in Detroit!

 

That's why i asked. I know that cities like Flint and Detroit suffered a lot, just wanted to know if it got worse or better. It things are really improving, that's good news.

 

This reminds me of a forum I was looking at a few days ago. It seems like getting into these old buildings and documenting whats in them is a hobby for some people for example heres a nightclub in sheffield:http://www.urbexforums.co.uk/showthread.php/10075-Niche-Nightclub-Sheffield?

It was a shithole when it was open and it hasn't changed since it shut. Now if only someone could get into the Bradford Odeon...

Edit: Googled Bradford Odeon exploration and it seems somebody got in. Top prize for them for getting in there with both the security and the asbestos.

 

Screams formally for shooting some jittering movies!

 

Some of those buildings are amazing, the things you could do with some redevelopment money!

 

I doubt you could find anything near the scale of Detroit. Blocks and blocks of burnt out and abandoned buildings with maybe one or two in-between being used.

Forget New York, Detroit would be the city the government fenced in to turn into a prison.

 

Wow -- a real life Dali.

 

Haha Niche.

I've done some urban exploration, have been here which was the best: http://www.derelicte.co.uk/denbigh-asylum

Huge place, really interesting.

The best I've seen was someone went on a mothballed frigate in a Royal Navy base. That takes balls!

As to Detroit...good place for a Fallout film.

 

Would love to do some urban exploring there, love those pictures thanks for sharing!