Detroit Ruinscape: The Heidelberg Project

Jessica Reeder — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 19:08:26 +0000

When I first told my friend Landry I was going to Detroit, she advised me to visit the Heidelberg Project. Thinking it was some sort of museum piece, I put it on the Maybe List—and later forgot about it completely as Detroit’s stark reality washed over my little head.

Nonetheless, later that day we drove right into Heidelberg Street by mistake. I’m glad we did: it quite blew my mind.

I’ll let you read the official backstory at heidelberg.org. Enjoy the video.

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Detroit and the Myth of the $100 House

Jessica Reeder — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 21:03:35 +0000

Stony Creek Sunset, originally uploaded by NnYSeb

America’s Rust Belt is a swath of cities and towns that boomed during the Industrial Era and now lie—well, rusting—as empty remainders of glory days past.

Chief among these is Detroit, Motor City. The longtime center of American automotive manufacturing was gutted when the Big Three car companies simultaneously failed.

Detroit, already plagued by corruption and crime, saw its unemployment rate skyrocket in 2009.

Source: Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis

What’s left behind when an economy collapses? Cheap real estate, that’s what.

Graphic courtesy of Mark J. Perry

I’d read a New York Times article about some forward-thinking artist-types who bought a house in Detroit for $1,900. $1,900! Some of us (and lots of New Yorkers) pay that much in rent every month!

In fact, the article went on, soon a nearby house went on the market for $100. The artist types notified their buddies, who moved in post haste.

I was intrigued. Really? A $100 house? Even if it was a real fixer-upper, even if you really were better off tearing it down than living in it, that’d still be a hell of a deal. Why, out in New Mexico, where you can still buy unincorporated land with no water or roads, you’d pay at least $1,000 for a house-sized plot of dust. So how can you buy an actual home for $100? That’s literally cheaper than dirt.

(...)
Read the rest of Detroit and the Myth of the $100 House (838 words)

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Post tags: community, death, Detroit, economy, featured posts, fire, ghost town, Michigan, pollution, starving artists, tourism, travel, video

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Uprooted, an eco/travel blog » Michigan

Detroit Ruinscape: The Heidelberg Project

Detroit and the Myth of the $100 House