Tough, Cheap, and Real: Detroit | Hacker News Reader

Tough, Cheap, and Real: Detroit

nationalgeographic.com

69 pointssamclemens55 comments

I've lived in Detroit my whole life, in both the suburbs and the city. If you take the time to read the stories and literature of Detroit from 1915-Today, you'd find that Detroit was the original Silicon Valley at the turn of the 20th century - we owned mechanical engineering and industrial operation engineering/mass production.

Today, in summary - Detroit has a long way to go to be considered at the same level as a Chicago or Boston, from a domestic/international reputation standpoint. And that's ok! Those cities have their own problems, and we have the opportunity here to re-build a city using 21st century urban planning and engineering knowledge. But Gilbert and Ilitch can only take it so far.

Would be nice to see some Fortune 500 companies relocating to Detroit. It's all about having a downtown where the 20-somethings meet their spouse and have families. SF/LA/SEA/CHI/NYC/BOS/DC have that down pretty well. Is there room for Detroit? Maybe. There's still 4+ million people here in Metro Detroit, so there's a blank entertainment canvas that the two billionaires have been constructing.

Cool to see Rocket Fiber deploying FTTH Downtown, Midtown, and Woodbridge/Eastern Market.

One little dirty secret - the levels of arsenic and heavy metals in the soil on ground they've torn down buildings is like nothing you've ever seen (75-100 years ago they didn't quite grasp that some chemicals shouldn't be used in building materials). It's toxic. Kim Worthy (city prosecutor) has a small project looking at the crime rates and lead exposure.

The old Fisher Body Plant had cyanide (yes, cyanide) baths for metal plating. Yeah.

Fellow near-native here, long gone though: We weren't the Silicon Valley of anything, because "Silicon Valley of" wasn't a meme yet. We were the Motor City, man. Silicon Valley is just the Motor City of computers.

Now it's another frozen cog in the Rust Belt. The Bay would do well to remember that: prosperity, and property values, do not always increase.

I know, I know. The Silicon Valley moniker resonates a bit better with audience here since this is Hacker News.

Cog? Total global revenue between the Big 3 (General Motors, Ford, Chrysler - all based in Detroit for you HN readers) is over $250 billion USD annually. Shitty margins though, yes.

People talk about the next $10B+ market cap company coming from something involving hardware. As software development skills become more pervasive, keep your eye on Detroit - you'd be surprised how much talent we've yet retained.

Fair points, but you are comparing apples and oranges in many ways.

The Bay Area as a geographic location outside of industry-related trends is objectively considered much more desirable to a larger percentage of individuals. You have amazing weather mostly year round, great food, interesting culture, many activities to do in neighboring areas (Tahoe, wine country, etc.), much closer to asian countries, etc. I get that there are reasons to live in Michigan (I grew up in Chicago), but the above reasons combined with the limited buildable land strike me as not really being a competition at all.

I feel like there are many more reasons to want to live in the Bay Area, and those reasons coupled with the very real limitations on housing will keep positive pressure on prices for quite some time even if the tech industry were to eventually tank.

> great food, interesting culture

There was a book at the turn of the last century which had a quote along the lines of: "a gentleman would only ever consider living in a handful of American cities: Philadelphia, Baltimore, Cincinnati, New York..."

Philly, Baltimore, Cincinnati--all have pockets of great culture, but it's clear they're the legacy of a bygone generation. I'm not even sure San Francisco has the kind of old money that would keep alive the culture at the level of those cities.

Yeah, about the lack of water in California... (I get that a vast majority of it is used for agriculture and can be re-diverted for personal consumption, but that is going to cause some serious upheaval for the local populace/economies in CA.

That's the main worry I have in terms of long-term impact on home values. If the Bay Area turns into a complete desert, that would be problematic.

But that's really the big environmental disaster I can think of. If there was an earthquake that didn't level the entire Bay, I actually think that wouldn't do much other than cause people to say "oh, people are scared, I'll bet prices will be down, I should buy now!"

Detroit, like Silicon Valley of today was the top income generating region in America.

My 99 year old dad remembers the twenties as a time of opulence and unbeatable optimism. People were arriving from all over the country to seek their fortunes.

great. move to detroit, get married, have kids, kids get lead exposure and become violent criminals.

I think you if do a new development on a newly purchased city parcel, and call the right people downtown, they'll send the state out to do remediation.

But yeah, no way I would build on vacant land in Detroit without getting the ground and water tested first.

> The old Fisher Body Plant had cyanide (yes, cyanide) baths for metal plating.

This is not some outdated thing like asbestos; bonding cyanides of metals together is pretty much just how you do electroplating. It's also not all that scary; there are a bunch of well-known industrial methods of neutralizing the cyanide afterward[1].

[1] http://www.sgs.ca/~/media/Global/Documents/Flyers%20and%20Le...

Fourth map on this page shows Detroit:

http://www.urbanleadpoisoning.com/

fun fact: the Valley's soil isn't that great either

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/07/not-ev...

This makes Detroit sound a lot like a Peace Corps for millenials—a place for young people with tons of energy to make a corner of the world better.

I think it says something about the relative lack of opportunity in the US today that people are moving to Detroit to do this. People want meaningful work that they can devote a portion of their lives to, and that's increasingly hard to find in the normal workplace.

It makes me sad to think that twenty-somethings have to move across the country to a forsaken, blighted city to find something they feel has meaning, but I'm happy that they have.

It will be interesting to see if Detroit can build on that wave of energy into a sustainable metropolis. Energetic twenty-somethings are great, but they aren't enough. You need a whole lifecycle of people, and that means parents. Until Detroit addresses crime and education problems, it's no place to raise a family.

Well, twentysomethings become parents sooner or later, most of the time.

At which point they move to the suburbs. My wife and I live in downtown Baltimore. At one point we seriously considered renting a house and moving her mom and teenage brother from the west coast. But the school/safety situation was just a deal-breaker. We've got a nice little bubble for a few blocks in each direction from where we live, but beyond that it's just miles of abysmal schools and gang violence. Twenty-somethings will put up with that. Parents will not.

In reality though, isn't it not going to change because the people that care/are in a position to care leave? I get that parents want the best for their children and I don't fault them for that, but I don't see it changing if people are like "Yeah it's bad, so I left, I wish I could help from over here."

Gentrification will solve the crime problem eventually. But the bigger problem is schooling.

I'd recommend the city going the school voucher route.

Considering how hard it is to establish charter schools in Maryland (at least, pending the outcome of a bill), that could be tricky.

it would be a travesty to yank the remaining funds from the public schools in order to subsidize private schools that are less accountable, typically religious, and usually much more expensive than the value of the vouchers. It would likely increase inequality and delay reform of the public schools.

https://www.au.org/church-state/february-2011-church-state/f...

If there's one thing that brings out the classism in people, it's kids. Even hyperliberal San Francisco had to give up on randomized school assignment. Wealthier parents just won't send their kids to the public schools in places like Baltimore. If you don't make it an option to have vouchers or "enclave" schools in wealthy neighborhoods, they'll just leave for the suburbs. And your tax base will go with them, and then you'll be Detroit.

"We've got a nice little bubble for a few blocks in each direction from where we live, but beyond that it's just miles of abysmal schools and gang violence"

So, you're in Canton then?

Canton, Fells, Fed Hill, Actual Downtown, Bolton Hill/Mt. Vernon, Pigtown, Hampden, I could keep going.

Baltimore is a checkerboard. Turn down the wrong street and you're fucked. Canton is no exception.

Yeah. I was trying to think of anywhere in Baltimore that gave a 2-mile buffer, and Canton was the best I could come up with.

I'm in Mt Vernon by Penn Station. Bolton Hill to the West is great, so is historic my Vernon to the south. But man wander north of North Ave...

I thought that, for certain, the bay was going to factor into the bubble. Statistically, the water is the safest part of Baltimore.

I do not think that is a trend that will perpetuate.

I fully support equality. I do no deserve more or less pay, more or less rights, more or less consideration, or more or less anything that someone of the opposite gender of myself.

N=1 anecdotal experience from friends, the feminist movement (again, I support) seems to have had the effect it had in japan [0] in that men are no longer interested in marriage, at least not at the rates they were before now.

[0]http://www.japantoday.com/category/lifestyle/view/increasing...

Detroit fascinates me for some reason. That a major city could disintegrate so thoroughly is sobering. But we should not lose sight of the fact that this nacent, yet-to-be-proven-viable recovery is only happening because $18 billion of incompetence, negligence, misdeeds and corruption by at least five decades of municipal governance is just being wiped out. And if they continue to run the city the way they have, it will happen again.

These articles always crack me up. This sounds great on paper, but the city is still messed up (and probably irreparable in my lifetime).

The article is talking about Downtown Detroit (as in 3-4 square miles). Detroit itself is a MUCH larger city... 130+ square miles. Not to mention... you only have 600k residents living in those 130 square miles. Focusing on 1% of the area (for the white and rich) is not going to help the rest catch up.

At some point you have to cut your losses and tell those people to relocate or pay for services outside the footprint the city is able to serve. Or let those residents incorporate into a new city and break Detroit up into 6 or 7 new city municipalities and have the State reboot it.

It hasn't come to that yet since the bankruptcy case has closed, but without the state of Michigan serving as a financial backstop, I am generally skeptical that Detroit City Council can manage a pool of money without going bankrupt. By the way, keep an eye on the pension funding levels for city employees, that is the next shoe to drop.

Downtown has to thrive and be a destination so Detroit can be a place for companies to relocate so that it can compete with other cities throughout the country for talent.

Accelerator in Detroit funded in part by Dan Gilbert (Quicken Loans) http://bizdom.com/

Detroit is cheap though downtown vacancy rate is very low. Finding a cheap apartment downtown would be challenging. Though would of course be much cheaper than SF/Bay Area

Why do we think cheap rent is such a factor in making a tech city? Innovating and inventing new tech is expensive. Everyone in the chain knows this, Founders, VC, tech workers. You pay them well (or in the case of Founders sacrifice alot) but, it's worth it in the end because the gains from that initial work are so large.

What makes a great tech city is access to a large pool of highly trained people. SF has this, LA (in theory) has this, Austin, NYC and other places in the US has this. Tech cities also should be places people want to go. Weather is a huge consideration. Detroit is cold. SF and LA are warm. I don't care that my rent is $500/mo if I'm freezing. I'll gladly pay $2,500 for the same place for 75F degree sunny weather year round.

Culture is another big aspect. When I'm not working, I want to find interesting things to do, places to visit, food to eat, people to interact with. I think this is why NYC would be a decent startup city despite it's terrible weather.

Density has a role to play that we don't fully understand. Austin would be a great example that checks all the boxes (and has a low cost of living to boot) but, hasn't exactly exploded as far as startups are concerned. Miami too as it has actually tropical weather and beaches.

Detroit is lacking is so many areas. Density is going to be a problem. Weather is a huge problem; most of the country is warmer and more temperate than Detroit (which is also on the lake so added windchill factor). Detroit is blighted which means unless you are 22 and like warehouse parties or some young hipster and enjoy the early stages of gentrification, Detroit isn't for you. Also, who wants to raise kids in Detroit? Lead in the soil? No thanks, I'd pay the extra money to live someone where my kid's IQ isn't stunted irreversibly.

My question is why are people still in Detroit? If you are going to try to make a new startup city, why not try Miami or Orlando or Austin or Dallas or San Diego? Why freeze your ass off, just so you can brag about it later? What is the city council going to do that's so freeing to your ability to write software?

I still do not understand people who care so much about weather. We're not talking about moving to the Gobi Desert or, I don't know, the South Sandwich Islands.

Besides, even if you do care about weather, I would pick Detroit over Florida or Texas any day. Cold in the winter is normal; 100 degrees in the summer sucks.

It gets colder in Detroit than it does on the South Sandwich Islands...

don't expect all people to have same mindset as you, and don't even try that with your/their priorities.

people live where they live, it can be great/miserable place on the paper, but real daily life can be vastly different

Autoplay audio, nope.

Seriously, who thought that was a good idea? Novel isn't the same as worthwhile.

In this context it's a good idea.

Love to see Rand Paul's ideas on economic free zone applied to Detroit.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/dec/6/rand-paul-pus...

I'm generally in support of economic zones, but a proper amount of planning needs to be done. Large companies shouldn't partake in the free zone for example, small companies should be favored, as well as companies that source their supplies from within the city.

Michigan Governor Rick Snyder has proposed that the Feds allow 50,000 additional visas for highly skilled immigrants if they're willing to live in Detroit for five years.

Priority would be given to graduates of Michigan universities. Despite widespread support from both parties in the state the Obama administration has yet to rule on the request.

http://www.crainsdetroit.com/article/20140123/NEWS/140129933...

As supportive as I am of this plan, how would the Obama administration (or the feds in general) benefit from this? It seems to favor Detroit by requiring that immigrants live in the city for five years while affecting the immigration policy of the nation. More cynically, Michigan isn't exactly a swing state for presidential elections, so I don't really see the angle here?

Given much of the country's antipathy towards immigrants, you'd probably get a lot of people saying it disfavors Detroit. Might be a good experiment to prove them wrong...

This would require a constitutional amendment. We have free movement in America. It's not the Soviet Union.

I'm assuming a conditional visa that transitions to permanent residency (green card) if one lives in Detroit for five years is legal, though. Many visas are restricted to employers, for example, and Canada has a similar system through the provincial nominee program.

Hmm. Now that you mention it, it would probably be much simpler, legally, to make something like a visa specifically granted to companies based in Detroit, to bring their workers to the US. The workers wouldn't be legally obligated to stay in Detroit... but the companies are probably going to want them to.

> This would require a constitutional amendment.

No, it probably wouldn't.

> We have free movement in America.

On a constitutional level, that's not necessarily true of immigrants. The states generally can't impose such limits on immigrants because regulating immigration is Constitutionally a reserved federal power, so it would be a Supremacy Clause issue. The feds, however, almost certainly can impose place-of-residency restrictions on immigrants without a Constitutional amendment.

That's not how it would work. The feds clearly won't even impose "are you here legally in the first place" restrictions. Bush and Obama have made that perfectly clear.

Anyway, the whole idea stinks of shit like the propaganda line "jobs americans won't do." You really think Americans are some sort of idiots that couldn't make use of the land and infrastructure in Detroit given proper reforms? Apparently we're too dumb and need some foreigners to lead the way.

> That's not how it would work.

How politically things are likely to work is a different question from what is Constitutionally required.

EDIT: also,

> The feds clearly won't even impose "are you here legally in the first place" restrictions. Bush and Obama have made that perfectly clear.

George W. Bush's administration engaged in some of the most extreme uses of every federal power available (and more)over immigrants since WWII in the wake of 9/11.

They may not have used that power where you want them to, but that's a different issue.

How would you make sure 50k stay in Detroit for more than a day? What would be the enforcement mechanisms?

I hadn't seen that, but I've been saying for years that if you went Detroit to come back, draw a border around it and make it a free trade, low tax special economic zone that was free from state and federal regulations and only having the US constitution applied. Within a decade people would be lining up at the borders wanting to get in. And it would be a brilliant experiment on how the current crony capitalism heavily regulated economy is the problem, and the solution can only be large scale reversal of all that.

Except that it wouldn't be an example of how a heavily regulated economy is the problem, because people who lived in the hypothetical future Detroit would likely be able to enjoy the unified benefits (social services, infrastructure, etc.) that come with better regulation. It's roughly equivalent to the "best of both worlds" benefit of tax havens in contrast to Western countries that tax fairly heavily. If you really wanted an example, draw a closed border around it and see what happens. I can't predict that, but it would be interesting to see.

I'm surprised that Google Fiber hasn't made a bid to move into Detroit - it seems like the issues they have with digging up yards and such would be minimal.

It's really spread out, and broke. Grand Rapids and Ann Arbor both tried to get Fiber when they were having their contest.

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