Detroit Moxie | DetroitUnspun - The Detroit Regional News Hub

Today, I walked outside of my house to find my car on slate bricks and my tires stolen.

First, I feel I have to give you this cautionary note. Becks Davis of Detroit Moxie said it right: bad things happen everywhere.

It’s irritating that I have to think twice about posting this, knowing it might spark some kind of reactionary tirade on the “dangers of the city,” or its counterpoint rah-rah Detroiters who are just as far from the mark in their zealous defense. If I lived in New York or Chicago, I’d worry a lot less about the city’s image problems before sharing my story.

Here, bad news sticks.

Still, I feel like I have to say something, even if more questions come out of this than answers.

So hear me out:

Detroit is a study in contrasts. Obviously the blight and development (often laid on top of one another) come to mind. But for me, this contrast also means equal parts home and curiosity. I’m here because, despite this isolated incident of a vandalized car, I feel safe. Living in a place that’s totally unlike the cities I’ve lived in before keeps me creatively energized.

I moved into my Hubbard Farms apartment about a month ago. I was in Ferndale at the time, and wasn’t even planning on moving until I saw the house and instantly, irrevocably fell in love.

Call me a victim of my generation’s overwhelming nostalgia for what we never knew, but I love this house. It was built in 1926 and still has all of its original doors and woodwork. It feels lived in. I felt I could really live in it.

I’m not an urbanist snob, resorting to vanilla/parking lot clichés when I talk about the suburbs. Getting my tires stolen really stings. I’d be lying if I said I didn’t consider moving again, but there are indelible perks to city living – particularly this city.

My rent is unfathomably cheap for a historic district. I have a short commute (I might bike this summer), a lovely balcony porch, a library branch down the street, and (ecstatically) a very short walk to the local taco truck.

I kept thinking about what Patti Smith said about creatives and the cities they move to: “New York has closed itself off to the young and struggling… My advice is to find a new city.” She offers up Detroit.

My roommates and neighbors are all artists of some sort. Previous occupants of the building have become unexpected muses, too. Before I moved in, the College of Creative Studies was using my apartment as a gallery space. My roommates and I found a dusty folder of art history slides on our porch propped up next to a guitar stand. There was some kind of taxidermy installation in my freezer (which has since been bleached), and other art projects stashed in my closets. It’s hard not to feel inspired by the work people are doing here. You can say a lot about Detroit, but you can’t ever, ever say it’s boring.

So I’m staying in the city with new tires (and locks) on my car.

Here’s my question to all you Detroiters:
What makes it worth it for you? What are you getting out of living in the city, knowing it’s wealth of problems? In light of the census news, the folks at the Craig Fahle Show are wondering the same thing.

Comment here. Fill in the form there. Maybe get a spot on the radio. I’d like to hear from you.

A Brit in Detroit Has No Requiem

I am a Brit, born and raised. I met my wife, who is from Detroit, seven years ago.

Before moving to Detroit, I was filled with dread and fear brought on by the bad publicity and propaganda about Detroit in the UK. Until then, the only the only thing I knew about Detroit was Motown, Detroit Rock City, and the “Big Three.”

Prior to my move here in December 2008, I was inundated with friends and family sending me newspaper clippings and telling me to watch documentary upon documentary about Detroit. Of course, most of this press showed the city in a bad light. So, as you can tell, I was very pessimistic about the move but moved anyway.

Since moving here I have come to realize that most of the things I had heard were wrong.

Yes, the economy is bad. Yes, work is not at a premium, but morale is high. People I meet ooze of positivity that things are going to get better and they are taking steps to spread a positive vision of Detroit.

I know everyone is aware of the masses of decaying abandoned buildings, but when I look deeper and think back to my younger days, it is no worse than London, Sheffield, Birmingham, or Nottingham, England were in their depressions. They recovered by reinventing themselves, and Detroit is doing that, too, starting with making people aware of all the good things metro Detroit has to offer.

You can read numerous blogs about Detroit all looking at the positive: Detroit Moxie and Positive Detroit come immediately to mind. I, myself, am not a blogger. I am a carpenter and would not normally put pen to paper (as they say) but recently I had the chance to watch a BBC Documentary called “Requiem for Detroit.” It was interesting to again see what the British media think of Detroit.

They focused on the negative side, showing the same pictures over and over again of the dilapidated buildings around a few of the worst-hit areas of the city. This was an eye opener for me as I felt they could have turned the camera 180 degrees at times and captured the bigger picture so their viewers could see the entire story rather than what they wanted them to see. They even showed a gentleman driving down the Lodge Freeway showing there is hardly any traffic on it, the same road that I have been stuck in traffic jams on numerous occasions at rush hour. Doesn’t that mean that people are using it if only to commute to and from Detroit for work?

I won’t deny there are certain parts of Detroit that I don’t particularly enjoy being in, but as work is work and having set up my own business, you go where the work is. Working in the office furniture business is surprisingly a busy industry. There are new companies opening up and existing companies expanding all over metro Detroit, which is in complete contradiction to the documentary that implies everything is closing down and everyone is leaving.

In fact, I have noticed over the last six months more and more companies are starting to move back to Detroit. Quicken Loans and Fathead both have plans to move back to Downtown. The Guardian Building, a beautiful and often overlooked skyscraper, is almost fully occupied for the first time since the early 80’s.

All this said, I would not want to leave Detroit now that I’m here. It’s a great place, full of life and some of the friendliest people I have ever met. The economy IS going to pick up. Detroit will reinvent itself to once again become one of the best cities in North America. I can feel it happening. All it needs is self-belief, which can only happen if the media stop putting us down and reporting on the bad side. There are many other cities all over North America struggling that don’t get the bad reputation Detroit does. If Detroit was really that bad wouldn’t there be TV shows like CSI Detroit? Not CSI Miami or New York?

Come visit Detroit and see for yourself, then compare it to any other big city in North America. Where else in the United States can you stand by the river looking south and see Canada? Visit when we’re having a special event like the largest techno music festival in the world (held every year) or the Red Bull Air Race and see the life it can inject into a so-called dead city.

Andy Davis owns AJD Office Interiors, providing cubicle systems, office furniture and custom offices.