Last class we discussed Detroit and the decline over the past decades. It seems most people associate the decline of Detroit with racial tensions experienced mostly in the 60's and though that was a major factor, if you take that out of the equation it was still evident that Detroit was set up for its demise.
Detroit is the “Motor City” and in the late 40's and 50's there was an economic boom which allowed families to buy the cars which Detroit was producing. As credit became more available, more and more Americans started owning their own vehicles. This automotive boom, along with a massive transformation of the landscape into a grid of single home dwellings which were accompanied by huge highway projects allowed Americans all over the country and epically Detroiters to sprawl out and live the “American Dream”
We have talked in class about the Michigan Central Station which met its maker in 1988 when the last Amtrak train left the station. It seems this building never had a chance. As I mentioned Detroit is Motor City, and as the automotive era exploded into what we see today. There seems there as little place for this old train station in the automotive capital.
So when you step back and look at it all; and I think Lee you mentioned this. The Michigan Central Station is sort of a visual representation of Detroit's rise and fall. The overwhelming grandeur of the building shows how Detroit was once a wealthy metropolis, but it seems to me, given all the factors: the automotive and housing boom and massive government initiatives to build highways . Michigan Central Station was bound to fall, and Detroit failed by the very means which made it, the automobile.
